•T'  7  “^  • 

no  i  0 


A^icient  Classics  for  English  Readers 

EDITED  BY  THE 

REV.  W.  LUCAS  COLLINS,  M.A. 


\^UPPLEMENTARY  SERIES.) 


THUCYDIDES 


V.  ‘  ' 


CONTENTS  OF  THE  SERIES 


HOMER :  THE  ILIAD, 
HOMER:  THE  ODYSSEY, 
HERODOTUS, 

C^SAR,  •  ,  ,  • 

VIRGIL. 

HORACE, 
iESCHYLUS, 

XENOPHON, 

CICERO, 

SOPHOCLES, 


,  ,  ,  By  the  Editor 

,  .  .  By  the  Same. 

,  ,  .  By  George  C.  Svvayne,  M.A. 

,  ,  ,  ,  By  Anthony  Trollope. 

By  the  Editor 

. By  Theodok-'  Martin. 

By  the  Right  Rev.  the  Bishop  of  Colombo. 
,  .  By  Sir  Alex.  Grant,  Bart.,  LL.D. 

. By  the  Editor 

.  ,  ,  By  Clifton  W.  Collins,  M.A. 


PLINY,  By  a.  Church,  M.A.,  and  W.  J.  Brodribb,  M.Ar 
EURIPIDES 
JUVENAL,  . 

ARISTOPHANES, . 

HESIOD  AND  THEO' 

PLAUTUS  AND 
TACITUS,  . 


By  William  Bodham  Donne, 
By  Edward  Walford  M.A. 
.  .  .  By  the  Editor. 

Rev.  Tames  Davies,  M.A. 
CE,  Cf.  .  .  By  the  Editor. 

William  Bodham  Donne. 

By  the  Editor. 

PLATO.  . 

THE  GREEK 
LIVY,  . 

OVID.  .  .  ^ 

CATULLUS,  TIB^Lu's,  &  PRQPERTIUS,  ByJ.  Davies,  M.A. 


LUCIAN,  . 


BOLOC^Y,,  • 


Cliffon  W.  Collins. 


By  Lord  Neaves. 
.  By  the  Editor 

'r  ' 

THE  Rev.  a.  Church,  M.A. 


•4 


if 


DEMOSTHENES.  . 
ARISTOTLE,. 
THUCYDIDES,  . 
LUCRETIUS, 
PINDAR, 


.  By  the  Rev.  W.  J.  Bhodribb,  M.A. 
,  By  Sir  Alex.  Grant,  Bart.,  LL.D. 
,  ....  By  the  Editor. 

,  .  .  By  W.  H.  Mali.ock,  M.A, 

,  By  the  Rev.  F.  D.  Morice,  M.A. 


THUCYDIDES 


BY  THE 

EEV.  W.  LUCAS  COLLINS,  M.A.d 

AUTHOR  OF 

‘etoniana,’  ‘the  public  schools,’  etc. 


J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY. 


BOSTON  COLLEGE  LIBRARY 
CHESTNUT  HILL,  MASS, 


s 


4 


-  .  MV 

^  -  «  •  *^  •  -'.  - 

*  T  •  •* 


-  ; 


lS  V  ■ 
!•  *. 


:  • 

'i  .  »n,  r  , 

1k  13 138  4 


r,. 


l-rir  _-.  * 


^^y. 

iv 


<  >4 


‘^'  * 


•_  s: 


•4. 


?A 

A6T<^ 


NOTE 


The  chapter  on  the  Plague  at  Athens  has  had  the 
advantage  of  revision  by  the  writer’s  friend,  Dr 
W.  A.  Greenhill. 

The  translations  are  all  original;  but  a  word  or 
phrase  has  sometimes  been  gladly  adopted  from 
!Mr  Dale’s  version,  and  from  Mr  Wilkins’s  para¬ 
phrase  of  the  speeches. 


W.  L.  C. 


CONTENTS 


CHAP.  1.  INTRODUCTORY,  . 

II  II.  PRELIMINARY  HISTORY, 

II  III.  CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR, 

II  IV.  OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES, 

II  V.  THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS, 

V 

II  VI.  THE  SIEGE  OF  PLAT^A, 

II  VII.  THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE, 

II  VIII.  THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA,  . 
II  IX.  DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON,  . 
II  X.  THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPHIPOLIS, 
II  XI.  ARGOS,  .... 

II  XII.  THE  FATE  OF  MELOS,  . 

II  XIII.  THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY, 

II  XIV.  THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE, 
M  XV.  CONCLUDING  REMARKS, 


PAOB 
.  1 

.  12 
.  21 
.  82 
.  53 

.  69 

.  82 
.  98 

.  108 
.  123 
.  137 
.  143 

.  149 

.  167 
.  185 


THUCYDIDES. 


CHAPTER  I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 

It  has  been  remarked  already,  in  one  of  the  earlier 
volumes  of  this  series,  that  when  we  use  the  word 
“  ancient  ”  of  the  Greek  and  Eoman  writers,  we  are 
employing  a  term  which,  from  one  point  of  view,  has 
a  very  unequal  application.  It  is  not  altogether  a  ques¬ 
tion  of  date  which  makes  a  writer  ancient  or  modern. 
It  is  the  position  which  he  occupies  in  the  cycle  of  the 
national  literature,  if  his  country  has  ever  reached  a 
high  pitch  of  civilisation,  which  marks  his  thoughts  and 
diction  as  recent  or  archaic.  Our  Anglo-Saxon  historians 
and  the  Arthurian  romances  are  in  this  sense  far  more 
ancient  than  Horace  or  Cicero.  “  There  is,  in  fact,” 
says  Dr  Arnold,  “  an  ancient  and  a  modern  period  in 
the  history  of  every  people  :  the  ancient  differing,  and 
the  modern  in  many  essential  points  agreeing  with, 
that  in  which  we  now  live.  Thus  the  largest  portion 
of  that  history  which  we  commonly  call  ancient  is 
A.c.s.s.  vol.  vi.  A 


2 


THUCYDIDES. 


practically  modern,  as  it  describes  society  in  a  stage 
analogous  to  that  in  which  it  now  is  ;  while  on  the 
other  hand,  much  of  what  is  called  modern  history  is 
practically  ancient,  as  it  relates  to  a  state  of  things 
which  has  passed  away.  Thucydides  and  Xenophon, 
the  orators  of  Athens,  and  the  philosophers,  speak  a 
wisdom  more  applicable  to  us  politically  than  the  wis¬ 
dom  of  even  our  own  countrymen  who  lived  in  the 
middle  ages  ;  and  their  position,  both  intellectual  and 
political,  more  nearly  resembles  our  oivn.”  More  than 
this,  there  are  cases  in  the  literature  of  the  same 
people,  in  which  a  single  generation  marks  the  step 
from  the  old  to  the  new.  Herodotus  and  Thucydides 
were  almost  contemporaries :  between  the  probable 
dates  of  their  birth  there  was  an  interval  of  scarcely 
thirteen  years.  Hut  the  distance  between  them,  as 
writers  of  history,  is  not  to  be  measured  by  a  chrono¬ 
logical  table.  In  Herodotus  we  have  the  ancient  chro¬ 
nicler,  with  all  his  charms  and  with  all  his  defects. 
He  is  at  once  story-teller,  geographer,  antiquarian,  and 
traveller;  at  times  he  seems  to  assume  the  licence 
allowed  to  story-tellers,  and  attributed  somewhat  un¬ 
fairly  to  travellers,  of  preferring  the  picturesque  and 
the  marvellous  to  the  baldness  of  fact.  Eut  we  have  to 
remember  that  the  readers  (or,  perhaps,  to  speak  more 
correctly,  the  hearers)  of  his  day  looked  for  this  kind 
of  intellectual  entertainment,  and  had  a  far  more  ready 
appreciation  of  the  legend  which  magnified  the  national 
heroes,  and  the  tale  which  described  the  Avonders  of 
strange  lands  and  peoples,  than  of  the  painfid  accuracy 
of  impartial  history. 


INTRODUCTORY. 


3 


Wlien  we  turn  from  the  pages  of  Herodotus  to  those 
of  Thucydides,  the  change  is  wonderful.  The  latter 
writer  is  fuUy  conscious  of  it  himself ;  he  feels  that 
he  is  the  teacher  of  a  new  school.  The  progress  of 
thought  in  Greece  during  a  single  generation  had  been 
greater  perhaps  than  ever  before  or  since.  Philosophy, 
rhetoric,  and  the  drama,  had  all  made  vast  and  rapid 
strides.  And  with  Thucydides,  history,  properly  so 
called,  began.  He  treats  his  predecessors  in  this  line 
with  even  scantier  courtesy  than  is  usual  in  such  cases. 
He  classes  the  “  story-writer  ” — there  was  no  word  as 
yet  for  “historian” — with  the  poet,  as  both  equally 
mythical  and  untrustworthy.  He  speaks  of  the  “  won¬ 
derfully  small  amount  of  pains  with  which  the  inves¬ 
tigation  of  the  truth  is  pursued  by  most  men,  who  com¬ 
monly  avail  themselves  of  what  they  find  ready  to 
their  hand.”  “  Men  accept  from  one  another  the  cur¬ 
rent  report  of  past  events,  without  putting  them  to  the 
test  of  examination,  even  when  they  have  taken  place 
in  their  own  country.”  *  His  own  method,  he  assures 
his  readers,  shall  be  something  very  different  indeed. 
We  might  well  be  inclined  to  smile  at  the  confident 
seK-assertion  of  the  following  language,  if  we  did 
not  know  that  the  promise  was  largely  justified  by 
the  performance : — 

“If,  from  the  evidence  here  advanced,  the  reader 
should  conclude  that  the  course  of  events  was  on  the 
whole  as  I  have  traced  it,  he  would  not  be  far  wrong ; 
instead  of  trusting  rather  to  what  poets  have  sung  about 


*  1.  20. 


4 


THUCYDIDES. 


them,  dressing  them  out  to  make  them  grander  than 
they  were,  or  to  what  the  chroniclers  have  put  together, 
rather  with  a  view  to  make  their  tale  pleasant  to  the 
ear  than  accurate  in  its  facts ;  hearing  in  mind  that  such 
matters  cannot  he  subjected  to  strict  examination,  in¬ 
asmuch  as  most  of  them  through  lapse  of  time  have 
won  their  way  into  the  region  of  fahle  so  as  to  lose  all 
credit ;  hut  holding  that  they  have  heen  traced  with 
sufficient  accuracy,  allowing  for  their  antiquity,  from 
the  best  data  at  our  command.  And  though  men 
always  think  the  war  of  their  OAvn  times  the  most 
important,  so  long  as  they  are  engaged  in  it,  hut  when 
it  is  over  bestow  their  admiration  rather  on  the  wars 
of  the  past ;  still,  the  war  of  which  I  write,  if  we  con¬ 
template  its  operations  and  results,  will  appear  the 
most  important  of  any. 

“iN’ow,  as  to  the  language  used  by  the  several  speakers, 
either  when  they  were  preparing  for  the  war  or  were 
actually  engaged  in  it,  it  would  have  heen  difficult  for 
me,  as  to  what  I  heard  in  person,  or  for  other  parties 
who  reported  to  me  from  various  quarters,  to  record  ex¬ 
actly  what  was  said.  But  I  have  set  down  what  each 
seemed  likely  to  have  said  as  most  to  the  purpose 
under  the  circumstances,  while  adhering  as  closely  as 
possible  to  the  general  sense  of  the  words  used.  But 
as  to  the  actions  of  the  war,  I  have  not  been  content 
to  report  them  on  the  authority  of  any  chance  inform¬ 
ant,  or  from  my  own  conception  of  them;  but  either 
from  personal  knowledge  where  I  was  present,  or  after 
the  most  careful  investigation  possible  in  every  case 
where  I  gained  my  information  fmm  others.  Very 


INTRODUCTORY. 


5 


laborious  were  these  inquiries;  since  those  who  were 
present  in  the  several  actions  did  not  all  give  the  same 
account  of  the  same  affair,  but  as  they  were  swayed  by 
favour  to  one  side  or  the  other,  or  as  their  memory 
served  them.  Possibly  this  avoidance  of  any  fabulous 
embellishment  may  make  my  work  less  entertaining ; 
but  I  shall  be  well  content  if  those  shall  pronounce 
my  history  useful,  who  deshe  to  gain  a  view  of  events 
as  they  really  did  happen,  and  as  they  are  very  likely, 
in  accordance  with  human  nature,  to  repeat  themselves 
at  some  future  time, — if  not  in  exactly  the  same,  yet 
in  very  similar  fashion.  And  it  is  designed  rather  as  a 
possession  for  ever  than  as  a  mere  prize  composition  to 
be  listened  to  for  the  moment.” — (I.  21,  22.) 

The  claim  which  the  writer  makes  on  behalf  of  his 
great  work,  boastful  as  it  might  seem,  rested  on  a  con¬ 
sciousness  of  power.  He  did  but  anticipate  the  calm 
judgment  of  posterity.  Lord  Lytton  has  called  it 
“the  eternal  manual  of  statesmen,”  and  the  great  Earl 
of  Chatham  insisted  on  it  as  the  one  Greek  book  with 
which,  whatever  else  might  be  neglected,  his  son  must 
make  himself  familiar.  Macaulay,  who  read  and  re¬ 
read  it  while  he  was  writing  his  own  great  history, 
pronounces  the  author  to  be,  “on  the  whole,  the  first 
of  historians  :  ”  and  his  biographer  tells  us  that  “  the 
sense  of  his  own  inferiority  to  Thucydides  did  more 
to  put  him  out  of  conceit  with  himself  than  all  the 
unfavourable  comments  bestowed  upon  him  by  the 
newspapers  and  reviews.”  *  The  ‘  History  ’  of  Thucy- 
*  Life  and  Letters,  ii.  237. 


6 


THUCYDIDES. 


dides  is  irideed  one  of  those  “  possessions  for  ever  ”  in 
the  great  ^storehouse  of  literature  which  has  never  lost 
its  value  It  may  be  doubted  whether  even  thn  critical 
Athenian  audience  who  first  heard  his  manuscript  read, 
were  as  much  impressed  by  the  genius  of  the  author  as 
the  world  af  modern  scholars  is  now,  after  the  lapse  of 
above  two  thousand  years. 

It  is  time  to  inquire  who  this  great  writer  was,  whose 
own  confidence  as  to  his  future  rank  amongst  historians 
was  so  largely  justified.  But  here,  as  is  so  commonly 
the  case  with  the  early  writers  with  whose  names  and 
works  we  are  so  familiar,  the  personality  of  the  man 
himself  escapes  us.  The  days  when  every  author,  great 
or  small,  was  to  have  his  voluminous  biography,  had 
not  yet  come.  Two  so-called  ‘  Lives  ’  of  Thucydides,  of 
comparatively  modern  date,  have  come  down  to  us ;  but 
they  may  both  be  referred  to  that  class  of  “  fabulous  ” 
narrative,  “  constructed  to  be  pleasant,”  for  which  he 
had  himself  such  keen  contempt.  This  much  only 
we  can  be  said  to  know  with  any  approach  to  accuracy 
as  to  his  early  life :  that  he  was  born  about  the  year 
471  B.c. ;  and  that  he  was  of  Thracian  descent  (for  his 
father’s  name,  Olorus,  is  Thracian),  though  he  was  a 
citizen  of  Athens.  We  gather  from  his  own  pages  that 
he  possessed  some  hereditary  property  in  gold-mines, 
in  the  district  of  Thrace  known  as  ScaptAHyl^  (“  the 
excavated  wood  ”),  and  that  he  saw  considerable  service 
himself  as  a  divisional  commander,  in  the  great  war  of 
which  he  became  the  historian.  He  is  said  to  have  taken 
lessons  in  rhetoric,  the  popular  study  of  the  day,  from 
Antiphon  of  Khamnus,  the  inventor  of  oratory,  as  his 


INTRODUCTORY. 


7 


admirers  termed  him;  and  competent  critics  have 
traced  a  correspondence  of  idioms,  which  is  at  lea^ 
curious,  in  the  extant  orations  of  the  master  when 
compared  with  the  set  speeches  which  the  pupil  intro¬ 
duces  so  freely  into  his  narrative  of  the  war.  He 
was  certainly  one  of  the  great  orator’s  warm  admirers, 
f(*r  he  characterises  the  defence  made  by  Antiphon, 
when  accused  of  treason  to  the  State,  as  the  ablest 
on  record.  The  young  Thucydides  is  also  said  to  have 
sat  with  Pericles  at  the  feet  of  the  great  philosopher 
Anaxagoras,  the  boldest  free-thinker  of  the  day ;  and 
some  hints  occur  here  and  there  in  his  history  of  a  con¬ 
tempt  for  the  national  superstitions,  which  are  thought 
to  savour  of  those  unpopular  opinions  which  led  to 
Anaxagoras’s  fine  and  banishment.  He  was  a  sufferer 
— one  of  the  few  who  completely  recovered — from  the 
great  plague  which  almost  depopulated  Athens  in  the 
second  year  of  the  war,  and  of  which  he  has  left  us 
such  a  full  account. 

The  personal  share  which  he  took  in  the  operations 
of  the  war,  and  his  conduct  as  a  general,  tvill  come 
before  us  in  their  proper  place  in  the  course  of  the  his¬ 
tory.  His  failure  in  the  campaign  in  Thrace  against 
Brasidas,  whether  it  was  his  fault  or  only  his  misfortune, 
resulted  in  his  banishment  from  Athens  (or  perhaps  his 
voluntary  exile  to  avoid  a  worse  sentence)  for  twenty 
years.  The  locality  of  his  exile  is  uncertain ;  probably 
he  moved  from  place  to  place.  Part  of  the  time  seems, 
from  some  of  his  own  expressions,  to  have  been  passed 
in  the  Peloponnese,  within  the  borders  of  his  enemies 
the  Spartans;  and  this  gave  him  the  opportunity  of 


8 


THUCYDIDES. 


judging  the  remaining  operations  of  the  war  from  the 
enemy’s  point  of  view.  “  It  was  my  fate,”  he  says, 
“to  he  an  exile  from  my  country  for  twenty  years  after 
the  campaign  against  Amphipolis ;  and  thus  having 
been  cognisant  of  the  operations  of  both  parties,  and 
more  especially  of  those  of  the  Peloponnesians,  by  reason 
of  my  exile,  I  could  calmly  and  at  my  leisure  learn  all 
I  wanted  about  them.”  *  Possibly  this  kind  of  neutral 
position  which,  as  a  banished  man,  the  writer  held 
between  friend  and  foe,  may  have  contributed  to  the 
impartiality  as  well  as  to  the  accuracy  of  his  narrative. 
It  was  no  doubt  during  that  long  period  of  enforced 
leisure  that  he  digested  the  materials  which,  as  appears 
from  his  own  statement  just  quoted,  he  had  ah?eady 
collected,  and  expanded  his  original  notes  (if  we  may 
use  so  modern  a  term)  into  a  methodical  history.  But 
it  was  probably  not  completed  in  its  present  form  until 
after  his  return  from  exile — when  Athens  had  seen  her 
Long  Walls  destroyed  by  the  Spartans,  and  these  suc¬ 
cessful  rivals  had  wrested  from  her  the  leadership  of 
Greece.  Thucydides  possibly  returned  with  Thrasy- 
bulus  when  he  freed  Athens  from  the  tyranny  of  the 
Thirty  :  certainly,  from  his  own  expressions,  it  was 
after  the  great  war  v/as  ended.  He  is  said  to  have  met 
his  death  by  assassination,  either  at  Athens  or  in  his 
own  domain  at  Scapte-Hyl^.  His  tomb,  with  the  brief 
inscription  in  a  single  line  of  verse, — “Here  lies  Thucy¬ 
dides  the  son  of  Olorus,  of  Halimus,” — was  for  some 
time  shown  at  Athens.  His  age  at  the  time  of  his 
death  is  left  uncertain — probably  about  seventy. 

*  V.  26. 


INTRODUCTORY. 


9 


He  left  bis  work  unfinished,  after  all.  Something 
like  a  fourth  part  of  the  period  which  he  intended  it 
to  embrace  is  left  untouched.  We  know  it  as  the 
‘  History  of  the  Peloponnesian  War ;  ’  hut  the  author 
did  not  live  even  to  give  it  a  name.  Of  the  eight 
“  hooks  ”  into  which  his  early  editors  have  divided  it, 
the  seventh  is  thought  never  to  have  received  his  final 
corrections — if  indeed  this  does  not  apply  in  less  degree 
to  the  preceding  books  as  well — and  the  eighth  is  left 
imperfect.  So  imperfect,  that  ancient  literary  gossip 
asserted  that  the  daughter  had  put  it  together  from  her 
father’s  notes ;  whilst  in  other  quarters  the  authorship 
was  assigned  to  Xenophon,  who  has  carried  on  the 
history  where  this  eighth  hook  leaves  it,  in  his  ‘  Hel¬ 
lenics.’  One  remarkable  point  in  which  the  last  hook, 
as  we  have  it,  differs  from  the  others,  is  in  the  total 
absence  of  those  rhetorical  and  argumentative  speeches 
which  form  so  important  a  feature  in  Thucydides’s 
work.  It  seems  very  probable  that  in  all  cases  the 
speeches  were  composed  and  inserted  by  the  author 
after  the  body  of  the  history  had  been  completed,  and 
therefore  are  not  to  he  found  in  this  last  and  incom¬ 
plete  portion.  It  has  indeed  been  asserted  that  they 
were  here  purposely  omitted  by  Thucydides,  because 
the  public  had  pronounced  them  to  he  tedious :  hut 
such  a  verdict  would  scarcely  have  been  in  accordance 
with  Athenian  taste.  It  is  evident  that  Thucydides 
himself,  supposing  him  to  have  possessed  the  physical 
qualifications,  would  have  made  a  consummate  orator. 
Demosthenes  must  have  held  him  to  have  been  a 
master  in  the  art,  if  there  be  any  truth  in  the  ti'adition 


10 


THUCYDIDES. 


that  for  his  own  improYement  he  had  copied  out  the 
historian’s  great  work  no  less  than  eight  times. 

It  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  Thucydides  nowhere 
mentions  or  alludes  to — unless  it  he  under  cover  of  his 
general  strictures  on  the  writers  of  the  past — his  great 
predecessor  Herodotus.  A  story  is  briefly  referred  to 
by  Suidas  of  the  boy  Thucydides  having  been  present 
when  Herodotus  read  his  history  in  public  at  the 
Olympian  games,  and  that  he  shed  tears  of  emulation, 
with  the  tacit  resolve  to  follow  in  his  steps.  But 
modern  criticism  has  gone  so  far  as  to  doubt  whether 
he  ever  read,  or  heard  of,  Herodotus’s  researches.  His 
own  death  probably  very  soon  followed  that  of  the 
earlier  historian. 

Whence  he  drew  his  materials,  independent  of 
personal  memoranda  and  verbal  information  from  co¬ 
temporaries,  we  can  very  imperfectly  guess.  The 
written  authorities  must  have  been  few.  He  mentions 
only  Hellanicus,  and  of  him  he  has  no  high  opiuion. 
The  text  of  existing  treaties,  some  of  which  he  gives  at 
length,  and  the  memoirs  of  Cimon  and  Pericles,  would 
probably  be  his  most  trustworthy  authorities.  It  is 
possible  that  he  may  have  met  with  his  fellow-exile 
Alcibiades,  and  gained  personal  information  from  him. 

The  only  division  which  he  has  himself  made  of  his 
work  is  not  into  ‘  books,’  as  we  now  have  it,  but  into 
those  periods  into  which  the  story  of  the  great  struggle 
between  Athens  and  Sparta,  which  distracted  all  Greece 
for  twenty-seven  years,  naturally  falls :  First,  the  ten 
years  from  the  attack  on  Platsea  by  the  Thebans  (b.g. 
431)  to  the  “Peace  of  Nicias”  (b.c.  421);  seconfily, 


INTRODUCTORY. 


11 


tlie  next  seven  years  of  comparative  suspension  of 
hostilities ;  and  lastly,  the  remaining  period  of  the 
war— of  which,  however,  he  has  left  the  last  six 
years  untouched.  His  work  might  perhaps  he  more 
fitly  styled  ‘  Annals  ’  than  ‘  History :  ’  he  gives  the 
events  of  each  year  separately,  dating  them  by  the 
successive  summers  and  winters.  This  plan  spoils  in 
some  degree  the  effect  of  the  narrative;  the  scene  of 
operations  is  continually  shifting;  and  he  leaves  a 
campaign  or  a  siege  at  the  very  crisis  of  the  interest, 
in  order  to  bring  up  his  arrears  in  other  quarters. 
This  arrangement  has  not  been  strictly  adhered  to  in 
the  following  pages. 


CHAPTER  IL 


PRELIMINARY  HISTORY. 

It  will  be  best  to  let  the  historian,  open  his  subject  in 
his  own  words.  He  gives  us  no  laboured  introduction, 
but  announces  his  theme  and  purpose,  and  his  motives 
for  undertaking  his  task,  with  a  dignified  simplicity. 

“  Thucydides  of  Athens  has  written  the  story  of  the 
war  between  the  Peloponnesians  and  the  Athenians,  how 
they  warred  with  each  other ;  having  begun  his  record 
from  the  very  outset,  expecting  it  to  prove  an  import¬ 
ant  war,  and  more  worthy  of  relation  than  any  that 
had  been  before  it ;  forming  this  opinion  both  from  the 
fact  that  both  parties  were  perfectly  equipped  for  it  in 
every  way,  and  seeing  all  the  rest  of  Greece  gathering 
to  one  side  or  the  other,  either  by  immediate  action  or 
by  manifest  intention.  For  this  was  the  most  import¬ 
ant  movement  which  had  yet  affected  the  Greeks,  and 
indeed  a  large  portion  of  the  barbarian  nations,  and 
one  might  even  say  a  great  part  of  the  world.  For  as 
to  the  wars  which  preceded  this,  and  those  of  still 
earlier  times,  to  ascertain  the  facts  with  any  certainty 
seems  impossible  through  lapse  of  time.  But  from  such 
evidence  as  we  have,  so  far  as  I  am  led  to  believe  after 


PRELIMINARY  HISTORY. 


13 


carrying  my  investigations  as  far  back  as  possible,  I 
do  not  think  they  could  have  been  on  a  very  extensive 
scale,  either  as  to  military  operations  or  anything  else.” 

He  proceeds  to  give  a  brief  summary  of  the  early 
and  half-mythical  history  of  Greece — the  first  instance 
of  an  attempt  to  apply  anything  like  critical  examina¬ 
tion  to  the  mass  of  current  legend.  That  the  result 
should  be  quite  satisfactory  is  not  to  be  expected  :  that 
it  should  display  so  much  of  the  true  spirit  of  historical 
criticism  is  the  wonder.  If  Thucydides  accepts  the 
story  of  the  great  Trojan  war  in  all  its  essentials  as  an 
historical  fact,  he  admits  no  more  than  all  students  of 
history  have  done  until  quite  a  modern  date,  and  what 
many  whose  authority  is  by  no  means  to  be  despised 
admit  now.  He  holds  that  there  was  a  great  united 
expedition  of  Greeks,  led  by  a  real  Agamemnon  against 
a  real  Troy,  and  that  this  it  was  which  first  drew 
together  the  various  tribes  who  occupied  the  Pelopon- 
nese  and  its  neighbourhood,  and  gave  them  some  kind 
of  national  cohesion.  He  even  accepts  the  muster-roll 
of  ships  and  men,  as  given  in  the  Iliad,  as  an  authentic 
record,  and  explains  the  length  of  the  siege  by  the 
difficulty  of  maintaining  so  numerous  a  force  without 
detaching  a  large  portion  to  obtain  supplies.  But  the 
importance  of  the  expedition  and  of  its  operations  has 
been  magnified,  he  has  no  doubt,  by  the  poets,  and  he 
considers  it  not  worthy  of  comparison  with  the  greater 
imdertakings  of  later  times. 

The  sketch  which  he  gives  of  the  ages  before  the 
Trojan  expedition  cannot  be  accepted  as  much  more 


14 


THUCYDIDES. 


than  a  clever  guess,  to  be  corrected  by  later  investiga¬ 
tions.  It  was  impossible  for  him,  as  later  historians 
with  their  greater  advantages  have  found  it,  to  sift 
with  any  very  satisfactory  result  what  Mommsen  has 
happily  termed  “the  rubbish -heap  of  tradition.” 
He  regards  the  Hellas,  or  Greece,  of  early  times 
as  overrun  by  migratory  and  restless  tribes,  who 
settled  in  such  districts  as  they  could  conquer  and 
hold,  until  driven  out  by  a  stronger  people.  They 
occupied,  according  to  his  view,  rude  hill-forts  amongst 
the  mountains,  difi&cult  of  access,  while  they  avoided 
the  plain  and  the  sea-shore,  as  liable  at  any  moment  to 
the  attack  of  an  enemy  from  land  or  sea.  The  most 
fertile  lands — Boeotia,  Thessaly,  and  the  Peloponnese 
generally — were  subject  to  the  most  frequent  changes 
of  inhabitants,  because  they  held  out  stronger  tempta¬ 
tion  to  the  invader  :  while  Attica,  with  its  poor  and 
unproductive  soil,  was  left  in  comparative  quiet,  and 
always  in  the  occupation  of  the  same  people.  Such, 
as  is  well  known,  was  always  the  popular  boast  of  the 
Athenians — that  they  were  “  sons  of  the  soil.”  Hellen, 
the  son  of  Deucalion,  whence  came  the  name  of  Hel¬ 
lenes — Pelops,  the  foreign  chief  who  came  from  Asia 
and  gave  his  name  to  the  peninsula — and  Minos,  king 
of  Crete,  who  established  a  navy,  put  down  piracy,  and 
colonised  the  islands,  —  are  all  treated  as  historical 
personages,  though  the  distinctly  fabulous  elements  of 
their  story  are  passed  over  in  silence.  It  is  very  pos¬ 
sible  that  Thucydides,  like  the  Eoman  historian  Livy 
at  a  much  later  date,  found  the  existing  national  belief 
in  these  rather  mythical  heroes  too  strong  for  him  to 


PRELIMINARY  HISTORY. 


15 


venture  upon  destructive  criticism.  To  reject  them 
altogether  would  have  been  to  reject  articles  of  the 
Greek  faith.  He  may  himself  have  retained  a  sort  of 
half-conventional  belief  not  only  in  their  personality 
but  in  the  legends  with  which  it  was  surrounded. 

It  is  from  the  return  of  the  Greeks  from  the  expedi¬ 
tion  to  Troy  that  Thucydides  would  seem  to  date,  the 
historical  annals  of  Greece.  It  was  eighty  years  after¬ 
wards,  according  to  his  reckoning,  that  the  great  Dorian 
migration  into  the  Peloponnese  under  the  “sons  of 
Hercules  ”  took  place:  then  Athens,  the  headquarters  of 
the  Ionian  race,  sent  out  her  colonies,  bearing  their 
generic  name,  into  the  coasts  and  islands  of  the  Archi¬ 
pelago,  and  so  settled  the  district  which  went  by  the 
name  of  Ionia ;  while  the  Dorians  from  the  Pelopon¬ 
nese  threw  off  their  companies  of  adventurers  into 
Italy,  Sicily,  and  the  coasts  of  further  Greece.  Then 
came,  as  he  considers,  the  advance  of  civilisation  by 
the  founding  of  navies — notably  by  the  Corinthians, 
who  by  their  position  on  the  isthmus  made  their  city 
the  natural  emporium  of  Greece;  the  increase  of  wealth, 
and  the  consequent  rise  of  despotic  governments,  by 
the  usurpation  of  some  one  powerful  individual — 
“Tyrants,”  as  the  name  went — in  the  several  cities,  in¬ 
stead  of  the  old  patriarchal  and  hereditary  kings;  until 
the  great  Dorian  state  of  Sparta,  or  Lacedaemon,  rising 
to  a  commanding  position  by  reason  of  her  long-estal> 
lished  government,  took  upon  her  to  vindicate  tlie 
cause  of  liberty  amongst  her  neighbours,  and  “  put 
down  the  tyrants”  in  the  several  weaker  states — Athens 
included.  Then  came  the  great  Persian  war,  which 


IG 


THUCYDIDES. 


had  already  found  its  own  historian  in  Herodotus,  and 
on  which  his  successor  does  not  linger.  But  it  was, 
as  he  notes,  out  of  the  results  of  this  earlier  war  that 
the  present,  of  which  he  is  to  write,  had  arisen. 
Lacedsemon  had  taken  the  lead  in  the  second  act  of 
the  Persian  invasion  (for  the  Athenians  had  abandoned 
their  city  at  the  Persians’  approach),  and  she  had  thus 
become,  from  circumstances  perhaps  even  more  than 
from  ambition,  the  chief  of  a  kind  of  informal  con¬ 
federacy  which  embraced  most  of  the  Greek  states. 
But  Athens  was  as  decidedly  superior  at  sea  as  Lace¬ 
dsemon  w^as  on  land.  Hence  arose  that  bitter  jealousy 
of  each  other — a  jealousy  strengthened  by  difference  of 
race,  of  character,  and  of  national  habits — which  led  to 
a  perpetual  condition  of  hostilities  more  or  less  open 
between  themselves  and  their  several  allies,  from  the 
final  repulse  of  the  Persians,  b.c.  480,  to  the  breaking 
out  of  the  Peloponnesian  war  in  431. 

Tliucydides  will  presently  give  us  what  he  notes  as 
the  actual  causes  of  the  rupture.  But  its  roots  lay 
deeper  than  any  overt  act.  Lacedsemon  had  lost  her 
supremacy  over  Greece  and  the  islands ;  and  Athens 
had  won  it.  The  history  of  this  momentous  change 
in  the  international  relations  of  the  several  Greek 
states  is  reserved  by  our  historian  for  a  later  page  of 
his  work  but  it  will  find  its  place  more  conveniently 

*  I.  c.  89.  “  To  follow  the  history  in  chronological  order,  a 

reader,  after  finishing  Herodotus,  should  take  up  Thucydides 
at  this  89th  chapter,  and  read  to  the  117th  inclusive  :  he  should 
then  go  back  to  the  24th,  and  read  on  from  thence  to  the  88tb 
inclusive :  after  which  he  should  proceed  directly  to  the  118th. 

• — Arnold. 


PRELIMINARY  HISTORY. 


17 


here,  when  we  are  considering  the  remoter  causes  of 
the  war. 

^  \ 

When  the  Athenians  had  returned  to  their  deserted 
city,  they  naturally  proceeded  to  rebuild  the  fortifica¬ 
tions  which  the  enemy  had  destroyed.  The  Lacedae¬ 
monians  were  jealous.  Walled  towns,  they  said,  were 
dangerous  things :  they  might  serve  an  enemy  for  a 
base  of  operations  (as  Thebes  had  in  the  late  war),  as 
well  as  protect  their  occupants ;  rather  than  rebuild 
their  own  walls,  let  the  Athenians  join  in  levelling 
the  rest  throughout  Greece.  But  the  leading  man  at 
Athens  was  still  the  Themistocles  who  had  laid  such 
stress  upon  the  “  wooden  walls  ”  in  the  first  Persian 
invasion  :  and  he  was  as  determined  upon  retaining 
the  stone  walls  now.  Lacedaemon  had  no  navy,  but 
her  infantry  were  the  best  in  the  world,  and  Athens 
was  not  to  lie  at  their  mercy — good  friends  as  they 
seemed  just  now.  He  contrived  that  some  months 
should  be  occupied  in  diplomatic  messages  to  and  fro  : 
the  Lacedaemonian  commissioners  were  feted  and  en¬ 
tertained  at  Athens,  but  on  one  pretence  or  other  not 
allowed  to  return  home  with  their  report.  Themis¬ 
tocles  himself  went  as  representative  of  Athens  to 
Lacedaemon,  and  waited  there — “expecting  his  col¬ 
leagues,”  he  said — until  he  heard  that  the  walls  were 
nearly  completed.  Then  he  appeared  before  the  Lace¬ 
daemonian  authorities,  and  told  them  plainly  how' 
matters  stood : — 

“  Their  city  was  now  put  in  a  sufficient  state  of 
defence,  he  said,  to  protect  its  occupants  :  and  if  the 

A.C.S.S.  voL  VL  B 


18 


THUCYDIDES. 


Lacedaen  onians  or  their  allies  had  occasion  to  send  any 
embassies  there  in  future,  let  them  understand  that 
they  were  sending  them  to  people  who  knew  what  was 
good  for  their  own  interests,  as  well  as  for  the  general 
interests  of  Greece.  When  it  had  seemed  expedient 
to  abandon  their  city  and  go  aboard  their  ships,  they 
had  found  the  spirit  to  do  so — without  consulting  their 
friends.  And  in  whatever  steps  they  had  taken  in 
concert  with  them,  they  had  shown  themselves  to  have 
as  much  sense,  they  thought,  as  other  people.  And  at 
this  present  time  they  held  it  best  for  their  city  to  have 
a  wall  round  it,  and  more  to  the  advantage  both  of  their 
own  citizens  and  of  the  allies  in  general ;  for  it  was 
impossible  to  give  an  independent  or  straightforward 
vote  in  council  for  the  public  interests  unless  they  stood 
on  equal  terms.  Either  all  the  confederate  cities,  then, 
ought  to  be  unfortified,  or  they  were  bound  to  hold  what 
the  Athenians  had  done  to  be  right.” — (I.  91.) 

Thucydides  does  not  take  upon  himself  in  this  place, 
as  in  so  many  others,  to  give  us  anything  like  the 
actual  words  of  the  speaker.  He  could  not  do  so,  of 
course,  from  any  good  authority — unless  the  speech  had 
been  recorded,  which  is  improbable — for  Themistocles 
was  long  before  the  writer’s  own  day  :  and  it  may  per¬ 
haps  be  some  testimony  to  the  general  faithfulness  of 
his  reports  of  cotemporary  speakers,  that  here  he  is 
content  with  giving  us  only  the  general  sense. 
miss  a  good  deal  by  not  having  the  shrewdness  and 
irony  ol  the  speaker  more  elaborately  conveyed  to  us 
in  the  polished  phrases  of  Thucydides.  Heed  we 


PRELIMIXA  R  Y  HISTOR  Y. 


19 


wonder  that  the  Lacedsemonians,  though  “  they  did  not 
give  vent  to  their  wrath  against  Athens  openly  at  the 
time,”  never  forgot  or  forgave  the  quiet  mode  in  which 
their  jealousy  had  been  baffled  1 

The  breach  grew  gradually  wider  from  other  causes. 
The  Lacediemonian  Pausanias,  who  followed  up  the 
campaign  by  some  operations  with  the  combined  fleet 
against  the  coasts  of  Asia,  was  accused  of  abusing  his 
powers,  and  even  of  a  leaning  to  the  Persian  interests, 
and  was  deposed  from  the  command.  Many  of  the 
allies  would  not  acknowledge  his  successor,  and  turned 
to  Athens,  with  her  powerful  navy,  as  the  natural  leader 
of  Greece,  and  its  protector  against  foreign  invaders. 
Athens  was  ready;  and  their  rivals  seem  to  have  accepted 
the  change  with  a  good  grace,  which,  under  the  circum¬ 
stances,  was  hardly  to  be  expected,  and  may  be  taken 
as  a  proof  that  Pausanias’s  conduct  had  become  over¬ 
bearing,  and  that  the  feeling  against  the  continuance  of 
the  Spartan  rule  was  strong  and  general. 

The  Athenians  soon  arranged  that  all  the  allied 
states  should  be  taxed,  either  in  ships  or  in  money, 
for  the  maintenance  of  a  navy  for  the  defence  of 
Greece.  Such  defence  was  still  a  strong  necessity ; 
for  (though  the  writer  before  us  does  not  mention  it) 
we  know  that  the  Persian,  though  driven  from  Greece 
itself,  still  maintained  strong  garrisons  in  the  coast- 
towns  of  Thrace  and  the  Hellespont.  This  money  they 
took  charge  of,  under  the  title  of  “  Treasurers  of  Greece,” 
depositing  it  in  the  temple  at  Delos ;  whence  it  was 
afterwards,  and  apparently  without  remonstrance, 
transferred  to  the  treasury  at  Athens.  Gradually  those 


20 


THUCYDIDES. 


smaller  states  whicli  were  allies  in  name  became  subjects 
in  reality.  If  they  failed  to  appear  with  their  con¬ 
tingent  when  summoned, — if  they  declined  to  pay 
arrears  of  ships  or  money, — if  they  gave  any  cause  of 
offence  to  their  new  leaders, — they  were  declared  con¬ 
tumacious,  and  reduced  to  a  state  of  undisguised 
dependency.  The  islands  of  I^axos,  Thasos,  and 
Euboea  successively  revolted  and  were  reduced;  and 
every  reduction  of  an  independent  ally  to  the  position 
of  a  mere  tributary  increased  the  power  of  Athens. 
And  from  time  to  time  the  sufferers  appealed  to  Lace¬ 
daemon  for  aid,  which  was  given — willingly  enough,  it 
may  be  conceived — whenever  there  appeared  a  fair 
opening  for  regaining  their  own  ascendancy;  so  that  an 
intermittent  succession  of  hostilities  went  on  for  twenty 
years.  There  had  grown  up  in  Greece  by  degrees  two 
great  rival  interests  and  systems,  of  which  Athens  and 
Lacedaemon  were  the  centres,  each  claiming  a  kind  of 
rule  over  the  subordinate  states,  and  even  the  right 
to  punish  any  breach  of  such  relation  on  their  parts. 
But  Athens  met  with  her  reverses  in  turn,  when  she 
took  part  in  the  internal  feuds  of  the  Peloponnese : 
and  when  a  truce  of  thirty  years  was  agreed  upon 
between  the  two  great  rivals,  Athens  had  to  give  up 
the  ports  she  had  acquired  on  the  Corinthian  gulf,  and 
to  lose  alb:)gether  her  hold  on  the  peninsula. 


CHAPTER  III. 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 

The  truce  which  bore  the  name  of  the  “  Thirty  Years** 
lasted  barely  fourteen.  They  were  years  of  activity 
and  prosperity,  and  of  accumulating  wealth  and  power, 
for  Athens,  all  which  was  watched  with  natural  alarm 
by  her  neighbour  and  rival.  Samos,  perhaps  the  most 
powerful  of  all  the  states  in  the  Athenian  league,  re¬ 
volted  and  was  reduced,  and  another  island  fleet  thus 
added  to  the  Athenian  navy.  The  tribute  paid  by  the 
several  dependent  states  was  gradually  increased,  and 
they  had  to  go  to  Athens  for  arbitration  in  all  cases  of 
dispute  among  themselves.  Her  rule,  from  that  of  a 
leader  amongst  equals,  had  become  an  imperial  govern¬ 
ment,  but  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  it  was  oppres¬ 
sive  or  unjust.  The  master-mind  in  the  city  was  Pericles, 
who  had  large  views  for  the  future  of  his  country.  He 
had  raised  the  material  grandeur  of  the  city  itself  to  such 
a  pitch,  that  Thucydides  says  that  if  the  stranger  of  some 
distant  future  should  come  to  look  upon  her  ruins, 
“  he  would  estimate  her  power  to  have  been  even  double 
what  it  was.” 

Perhaps  the  ablest  and  bitterest  enemy  of  the 


22 


THUCYDIDES. 


Athenian  rule  was  Corinth.  She  was  the  earliest  naval 
power  in  Greece,  and  Athens  had  eclipsed  her.  Her 
position  on  “  the  two  seas  ”  gave  her  great  commer¬ 
cial  opportunities,  and  Athens,  by  her  occupation  of 
Megara  and  its  ports  (though  she  had  had  to  give  these 
up),  had  interfered  with  her.  From  Corinth  one  of 
the  overt  causes  of  me  nreaking-out  of  the  great  war 
arose.  Settlers  from  Corinth  had  colonised  the  island 
of  Corcyra  (Corfu) ;  and  Corcyra  in  its  turn  had 
thrown  off  a  fresh  swarm  of  colonists  to  Epidamnus,  on 
the  coast  of  Illyria.*  In  this  new  settlement,  one  of 
the  usual  feuds  between  nobles  and  commons  led  to  an 
appeal  on  the  one  side  to  Corcyra,  and  on  the  other 
to  Corinth  as  their  common  ancestress :  and  Corinth, 
already  jealous  of  the  Corcyraeans  as  having  shown  too 
little  deference  to  the  mother  state,  at  once  prepared 
for  war  against  her  refractory  daughter.  After  some 
vain  attempt  at  negotiations,  a  severe  engagement  took 
place  between  the  two  fleets,  in  which  the  colonists 
(who  mustered  no  less  than  a  hundred  and  twenty 
sail)  were  victorious.  But  they  felt  that,  standing 
alone  as  they  did,  belonging  to  neither  of  the  great 
confederacies,  they  should  he  no  match  for  Corinth 
in  a  prolonged  struggle :  they  appealed  for  aid  to 
Athens,  and  asked  to  he  admitted  into  her  confeder¬ 
acy.  The  Athenians  were  unwilling,  by  an  act  of 
overt  hostility,  to  break  the  thirty  years’  truce  with  the 
Peloponnesians ;  and  this  they  thought  to  avoid  by 
concluding  with  Corcyra  a  defensive  alliance  only. 
“  They  foresaw,”  says  Thucydides,  “  that  in  any  case 
*  Called  by  the  Romans  Dyrrhachium — the  modern  Durazzo. 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 


a  war  with,  the  Peloponnesians  they  must  have ;  and 
they  did  not  care  to  let  Corcyra,  with  so  large  a  naval 
force,  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Corinthians,  but  pre¬ 
ferred  that  the  two  powers  should  wear  themselves  out 
as  much  as  possible  against  each  other,  that  so  they 
might  find  the  Corinthians  and  other  naval  states  all 
the  weaker  when  they  went  to  war  with  them,  if  such 
necessity  should  arise.” 

A  squadron  of  ten  ships  was  sent  to  Corcyra,  with 
orders  not  to  act  against  the  Corinthians  except  in 
defence  of  the  island.  Such  orders  are  seldom  very 
strictly  obeyed.  In  a  sea-fight  which  followed,  the 
Athenian  contingent  ranged  itself  in  line  of  battle 
with  the  Corcyraeans,  and  when  they  saw  their  friends 
hard  pressed,  fairly  charged  the  victorious  enemy. 

Such  was  the  first  ground  of  rupture  between  the 
Corinthians  and  Athenians  —  that  the  latter  had,  in 
time  of  truce,  fought  against  them  on  the  side  of  the 
Corcyraeans.” 

Another  act  of  aggression  was  charged  against  them 
in  the  matter  of  Potidaea,  a  Corinthian  settlement  on 
the  Isthmus  of  Pallene  in  Thrace,  but  now  in  alliance 
with  Athens.  The  Athenians  had  reason  to  know 
that  this  doubtful  ally,  at  the  instigation  of  the  king 
of  Macedon  (and  they  believed  of  the  Corinthians 
also),  was  meditating  revolt ;  and  they  anticipated  the 
danger  which -might  have  involved  the  defection  of 
all  their  dependencies  in  that  quarter  by  a  peremptory 
summons  to  pull  down  part  of  their  wall,  dismiss  the 
Corinthian  magistrates,  and  give  hostages  for  their 
fidelity.  A  strong  naval  and  land  force  was  sent  to 


24 


THUCYDIDES. 


enforce  these  demands.  The  Potidseans  refused  them, 
and  declared  their  independence.  Aid  was  sent  to 
them  at  once  from  Corinth;  hut  the  Athenian  com¬ 
mander  drove  the  relieving  force  inside  the  walls,  and 
strictly  blockaded  Potidsea  by  land  and  sea.  And 
hence  arose  a  second  case,  alleged  by  both  parties,  of  a 
direct  breach  of  the  existing  treaties :  the  Corinthians 
making  it  ground  of  complaint  that  the  Athenians  had 
attacked  a  colony  of  theirs ;  and  Athens  on  her  part 
asserting  that  the  Peloponnesians  had  tampered  with 
one  of  their  allies  and  tributaries,  excited  them  to 
revolt,  and  aided  them  with  force  of  arms.  “  But  not 
yet,”  says  the  historian,  “  had  war  actually  broken  out ; 
there  was  still  a  pause  before  the  conflict,  for  the  Corin¬ 
thians  had  acted  on  their  own  independent  account.” 

But  now  they  appeared  by  their  envoys  at  Lacedae¬ 
mon,  and  there,  in  a  general  congress  to  which  the 
representatives  of  all  the  confederate  states  were  sum¬ 
moned,  publicly  accused  Athens  of  having  broken  the 
terms  of  the  truce.  Megara  and  ^gina  were  equally 
loud  in  complaint.  An  embassy  had  also  just  arrived 
from  Athens  on  other  business,  and  was  allowed  to  be 
present  at  the  debate.  Our  author  gives  at  some  length 
Uie  orations  delivered,  or  which  might  have  been  de¬ 
livered,  by  the  representatives  of  both  interests.  The 
deputies  from  Corinth  reserved  their  special  act  of 
accusation  until  the  last,  after  the  other  complainants 
had  been  heard,  in  order  to  give  full  effect  to  their 
denunciation.  Their  exordium  is  an  example  of  the 
acknowledged  rule  in  rhetoric — to  begin  by  gaining,  if 
possible,  the  favour  of  the  court ; — > 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 


25 


“  Your  own  good  faith,  men  of  Lacedaemon,  in  your 
internal  politics  and  in  your  dealings  with  your  neigh¬ 
bours,  makes  you  naturally  inclined  to  give  less  credit 
to  any  accusation  we  have  to  prefer  against  others ; 
and  this  same  character,  while  it  makes  you  temperate 
in  your  judgment,  leaves  you  more  ignorant  than  you 
ought  to  be  of  what  is  going  on  elsewhere.” 

The  encroachments  of  Athens  upon  the  liberties  of 
Greece,  they  went  on  to  say,  had  long  been  notorious. 
They  were  bold  to  assert  that  for  this  Lacedaemon 
herself  was  somewhat  to  blame,  as  having  allowed 
Athens  to  rebuild  her  walls,  and  tacitly  permitted  her 
to  override  her  w’eaker  neighbours.  The  orator  is 
very  plain-spoken  as  to  the  duties  of  strong  neutral 
powers : — 

“  It  is  not  the  state  which  actually  destroys  the 
liberty  of  others,  but  the  state  which  has  the  power  to 
prevent  this  and  will  not  use  it,  which  is  really  guilty; 
especially  when  it  enjoys  an  honourable  reputation  as 
the  deliverer  of  Greece.  .  .  .We  know  well  by 
what  roads  and  with  what  gradual  approaches  Athens 
moves  upon  her  neighbours.  So  long  as  she  fancies 
she  can  escape  detection  owing  to  your  apathetic  nature, 
she  will  not  venture  too  far ;  but  when  she  feels  that 
though  you  see  her  designs  you  take  no  notice,  then 
she  will  urge  them  forward  with  the  strong  hand. 
For  you,  Lacedasmonians,  are  the  only  power  in  all 
Greece  who  sit  inactive,  defending  yourselves  against 
your  enemies  not  by  prompt  exercise  of  strength  but 


26 


THUCYDIDES. 


by  mere  demonstration,  and  who  proceed  to  crush  the 
groMdh  of  a  hostile  power,  not  in  its  early  stages  but 
in  its  fidl  development.  Yet  you  used  to  be  reckoned 
men  to  be  depended  on,  whereas  this  character  rests 
rather  on  repute  than  on  fact.  For  we  know  our¬ 
selves  that  the  Mede  had  marched  from  the  ends  of  the 
earth  upon  the  Peloponnese,  before  you  were  ready  to 
meet  him  in  any  adequate  force  :  and  now  these  Athe¬ 
nians,  who  are  not,  like  the  Mede,  far  away,  but  close  at 
hand,  you  take  no  heed  of ;  but  instead  of  taking  the 
first  step  against  them,  you  prefer  waiting  to  defend 
yourselves  when  they  attack  you,  and  to  risk  everything 
by  postponing  the  struggle  until  they  shall  have  become 
far  stronger  than  they  are  now.  .  .  .  Let  no  one 
think  this  language  is  spoken  in  enmity — it  is  in  re¬ 
monstrance  :  we  may  remonstrate  even  with  our  friends, 
when  they  make  mistakes ;  accusation  is  for  the  enemies 
who  have  wronged  us.” 

If  the  Corinthian  spokesman  really  “  dealt  so  faith¬ 
fully”  with  his  hearers,  and  if  the  Lacedsemonians 
listened  to  his  utterances  as  to  the  wise  words  of  a 
friend,  it  was  creditable  to  the  honesty  of  both,  and 
stands  out  in  favourable  contrast  with  very  much  of 
modern  political  oratory.  But  it  may  be  possible  for  a 
reader,  without  incurring  the  charge  of  needless  scep¬ 
ticism,  to  fancy  that  he  discerns  the  strictures  of  an 
Athenian  statesman  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  Corin¬ 
thian  envoy.  So  when,  a  little  further  on,  the  orator 
goes  on  to  estimate  and  criticise  the  dangerous  enemies 
with  whom  they  would  soon  have  to  deal,  we  might 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 


fancy  that  we  detect  the  subtle  irony  which  implies 
praise  under  cover  of  censure.  The  Athenians,  says 
their  accuser — 

“  Are  bold  beyond  their  strength,  venturous  even 
against  their  judgment,  sanguine  in  the  midst  of  dan¬ 
ger  ;  while  your  wont  is  to  let  your  deeds  fall  below 
your  powers,  in  judgment  scarcely  to  trust  even  to  cer¬ 
tainties,  and  in  danger  never  to  entertain  a  hope  of 
escape.  Verily  they  are  as  prompt  as  you  are  dilatory, 
as  fond  of  foreign  expeditions  as  you  are  of  home  ;  for 
they  think  they  may  gain  somewhat  by  going  abroad, 
you  fancy  that  by  such  expeditions  you  may  even  risk 
what  you  have.  When  they  are  victorious  over  their 
enemy,  they  follow  up  their  success  to  the  utmost,  and 
when  beaten  they  least  lose  heart.  .  .  .  When  they 
fail  in  a  design,  they  look  upon  themselves  as  robbed 
of  their  just  due ;  when  they  succeed  in  making  an 
acquisition,  they  hold  it  trifling  compared  with  what 
they  intend  shall  follow.  .  .  .  They  have  little  enjoy¬ 
ment  of  what  they  have,  because  they  are  always  busy 
getting  more ;  their  only  idea  of  a  festival  is  the  dis¬ 
charge  of  a  duty,  and  they  consider  inactive  leisure  a 
greater  infliction  than  laborious  occupation.  In  short, 
one  might  very  fairly  sum  up  their  character  by 
saying  that  they  were  born  to  have  no  rest  them¬ 
selves,  nor  to  allow  their  neighbours  to  have  any.” — • 
(I.  68-71.) 

The  speaker  ended  by  calling  on  the  Lacedaemonians 
to  deliver  Potidaea,  and  thus  maintain  their  high  posi- 


28 


THUCYDIDES. 


tion  in  Greece — “tlie  noble  inheritance  which  their 
fathers  had  bequeathed  to  them.” 

Then  the  Athenian  envoys  asked  permission  to  speak. 
Xot  in  reply  to  the  accusation,  they  said — for  they  did 
not  admit  the  jurisdiction  of  that  court — but  on  the 
general  question.  Greece  had  no  need  to  fear  them — 
and  much  reason  to  be  proud  of  them.  Had  they  all 
forgotten  Marathon  and  Salamisl  Were  the  Lacedae¬ 
monians  jealous  of  their  dominion?  It  was  a  greatness 
that  Lad  been  thrust  upon  them  in  the  first  instance  ; 
they  had  but  accepted  the  leadership  of  Greece  at  the 
request  of  the  Greeks  themselves.  But,  granted  that 
they  did  not  care  to  retire  from  this  position,  now  that 
they  had  once  attained  it, — was  there  anything  un¬ 
natural  in  that  ?  And  if  the  states  now  dependent  on 
Athens  were  to  change  their  masters,  and  come  under 
the  power  of  some  others  they  could  name,  would  their 
position  be  improved  ? 

“  Do  not  resolve,  then,  hastily,  for  this  is  no  mere 
question  of  the  moment ;  do  not  be  led  away  by  other 
people’s  fancies  and  complaints,  and  so  bring  trouble 
on  yourselves ;  but  consider,  before  you  involve  your¬ 
selves  in  it,  how  very  apt  war  is  to  disappoint  all  cal¬ 
culations,  and  how,  when  protracted,  its  results  come 
to  depend  mainly  upon  fortune,  which  is  beyond  the 
control  of  either  party,  and  whose  event  both  have  to 
risk  in  the  dark.  When  men  have  to  contend  with  an 
enemy,  they  are  too  apt  to  begin  with  action,  which 
should  be  the  last  resort ;  and  only  when  they  get  into 
.difficulties  they  apply  themselves  to  negotiation.  But 
we  have  not  yet  taken  this  false  step,  nor  do  we  see 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 


29 


that  you  have;  and  we  adjure  you,  while  prudent 
counsels  are  still  within  the  choice  of  both,  not  to 
violate  the  treaty  or  break  your  oaths,  but  to  let  the 
points  in  dispute  be  settled  by  arbitration,  in  accord¬ 
ance  with  the  terms.  Or  else,  calling  to  witness  the 
gods  who  received  our  oaths,  we  will  try  to  meet  you 
if  you  begin  hostilities,  on  whatever  path  you  lead  the 
way.” — (I.  78.) 

The  representatives  of  the  confederate  states  were 
ordered  to  withdraw,  that  the  Lacedaemonians  might 
deliberate  among  themselves  in  council.*  The  majority 
of  the  voices  were  for  immediate  war ;  but  Archidamus, 
second  of  that  name,  who  was  then  one  of  the  two 
kings,  urged  upon  them  milder  counsels.  He  was  old 
enough,  he  said,  to  have  seen  something  of  war,  and 
he  knew  what  it  was.  He  knew  also  the  strength  of 
Athens.  They  were  no  match  for  her  in  resources — 
especially  in  ships  and  money.  In  heavy  infantry,  no 
doubt,  they  were  superior;  but  heavy  infantry  could 
not  be  employed  everywhere.  “  Let  us  not  buoy 
ourselves  up,”  he  warns  them,  “with  that  delusive 
hope  that,  if  we  do  but  lay  waste  their  lands,  the 
war  will  soon  be  over;  I  rather  fear  that  we  may 
leave  it  as  a  heritage  to  our  children.”  Let  them  try 
negotiation  first;  meanwhile,  let  them  improve  their 
revenue,  and  make  good  preparation  for  war  if  it  must 
come. 

*  The  subordinate  states  in  the  Spartan  confederacy  seem  to 
have  been  allowed  only  to  give  their  several  votes  in  these 
conventions  either  in  confirmation  or  rejection  of  a  measure 
proposed  by  Sparta. 


30 


THUCYDIDES. 


The  debate  was  closed  by  Sthenilaidas,  one  of  the 
Ephors,  and  who  in  that  capacity  had  to  take  the 
votes,  in  a  speech  of  true  Spartan  brevity,  which  we 
may  well  conceive  as  having  been  actually  spoken. 
It  is  perhaps  the  only  instance  in  which  any  distinct 
peculiarity  of  style,  national  or  individual,  appears  in 
any  of  these  orations  :  — 

“The  long  harangue  of  the  Athenians  I  do  not 
understand :  they  praised  themselves  a  good  deal,  but 
they  never  denied  they  had  wronged  our  allies  and  the 
Peloponnese  generally.  And  if  they  did  show  them¬ 
selves  good  men  and  true  in  past  days  against  the 
Medes,  yet  show  themselves  bad  men  towards  us  now, 
why,  they  deserve  double  punishment,  for  having 
turned  from  good  to  bad.  Put  we  are  the  same  men 
now  that  we  were  then ;  and  if  we  be  wise,  we  shall 
not  see  our  allies  wronged,  or  put  off  avenging  them ; 
for  they  cannot  put  off  their  suffering.  Others  may 
have  plenty  of  money,  and  ships,  and  horses ;  we  have 
trusty  allies,  whom  we  are  not  to  sacrifice  to  the 
Athenians,  or  leave  the  question  to  arbitration  and 
talk — it  is  not  by  talk  that  we  are  being  injured — ^but 
avenge  them  at  once  with  all  speed  and  with  all  our 
might.  And  let  no  man  tell  me  that,  when  we  are 
wronged,  we  must  consider  about  it :  it  is  more  fitting 
for  people  to  consider — and  consider  a  long  time,  too 
—before  they  do  a  wrong.  Vote  for  war,  then, 
Lacedaemonians,  as  befits  the  honour  of  Sparta;  and 
do  not  let  the  Athenians  increase  their  power,  nor  let 
us  desert  our  allies,  but  put  our  trust  in  the  gods,  and 
march  at  once  against  these  wrong-doers.” — (I.  86.) 


CAUSES  OF  THE  WAR. 


31 


"War  was  voted,  by  a  large  majority — “  not  so  much,” 
says  Thucydides,  “  because  they  had  been  convinced 
by  the  arguments  of  their  allies,  as  because  they  feared 
the  growing  power  of  Athens.”  They  next  sent  to 
Delphi  to  consult  the  oracle;  and  the  answer,  as  re¬ 
ported,  ran  to  this  effect :  “If  thev  made  war  with  all 
their  might,  the  victory  shuida  oe  theirs ;  and  that  the 
god  himself  would  help  them,  whether  they  summoned 
him  or  not.” 

In  accordance  with  the  constitution  of  the  Spartan 
League,  the  subject-allies  were  now  called  upon  to  con¬ 
firm  or  reject  the  decision.  They  were  convoked  at 
Delos;  and  again  envoys  came  from  Corinth  to  reiterate 
their  appeal.  Again  they  inveighed  against  the  growing 
ambition  of  Athens,  and  prophesied  success  if  all  did 
but  co-operate  against  her  vigorously ;  but  operations 
must  be  immediate  to  be  effectual,  for  Potidaea  was 
in  danger  of  falling  every  day. 

The  votes  of  the  confederate  states  were  taken  in 
succession,  and  the  majority  were  for  war.  They  were 
unprepared  for  immediate  action,  but  they  undertook 
to  provide  their  several  contingents  with  as  little  delay 
as  might  be.* 

*  It  may  be  well  to  note  in  this  place  the  chief  allies  and 
dependants  of  both  parties  during  the  war.  On  the  side  of 
Athens — the  islands  of  the  Archipelago  and  its  neighbourhood 
generally  (except  Melos  and  Thera,  which  were  neutral),  and 
of  Corcyra  and  Zacynthus  ;  the  Ionian  colonies  on  the  coast 
of  Asia  Minor ;  and  the  towns  of  Platsea  and  Naupactus  in 
Greece  itself.  On  the  side  of  Lacedaemon — the  whole  of  the 
Peloponnese  except  Argos  and  Achaia  (neutral),  Megara,  Bceotia, 
Locris,  Phocis,  &c.,  in  Greece  proper. 


CHAPTER  rV. 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 

It  was  full  a  year  after  the  Lacedsemonians  had  de¬ 
cided  upon  war  that  hostilities  actually  began.  They 
sent  repeated  embassies  to  Athens  with  complaints ; 
not  so  much,  says  the  historian,  with  a  view  to  ar¬ 
ranging  the  dispute,  as  “in  order  that  they  might 
show  as  good  cause  as  possible  for  going  to  war,  if 
the  Athenians  would  not  listen  to  them.” 

Both  parties  had  invoked  the  aid  of  the  gods  in 
what  each  protested  was  the  cause  of  right  and  justice. 
Both  now  sought  to  put  their  adversaries  in  the  wrong 
on  the  religious  ground.  The  Lacedsemonians  sent  a 
solemn  demand  to  the  Athenians  “  to  purge  themselves 
from  the  breach  of  sanctuary  in  the  matter  of  Cylon.” 
It  was  an  old  story,  dating  back  nearly  two  hundred 
years.  This  Cylon,  with  a  body  of  partisans,  had  seized 
the  Acropolis  of  Athens  with  the  view  of  setting  up 
a  despotism;  had  failed,  and  made  his  escape.  But 
some  of  his  adherents  had  taken  sanctuary  at  the  altar 
of  Minen’^a  in  the  citadel,  had  been  tempted  from 
there  by  the  promise  of  safety,  and  afterwards  put  to 
death.  The  parties  implicated  in  this  sacrilegious 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


33 


proceeding  had  been  banished,  but  afterwards  allowed 
to  return;  and  the  demand  now  was — avowedly  in 
deference  to  the  national  religious  feeling  of  Greece — 
that  the  descendants  of  this  accursed  race  should  at 
once  be  expelled  from  Athens.  But  the  real  object  of 
disinterring  such  a  question  at  this  moment  was,  no 
doubt,  as  Thucydides  considers  it  to  have  been,  to  caU 
upon  Athens  for  the  expulsion  of  her  ablest  citizen 
and  most  earnest  advocate  of  resistance.  Pericles,  by 
his  mother’s  side,  was  descended  from  the  great  house 
of  Alcm^eon,  who  were  implicated  in  the  charge.  It 
was  not  probable  that  Athens  would  comply  with  the 
demand ;  and  here  would  be  another  pretext  for  war, 
under  a  religious  sanction. 

The  Athenians  were  not  slow  in  retorting.  They  had 
even  a  double-edged  weapon  of  the  kind  to  bring  to  bear 
against  their  enemies.  There  was  the  notorious  case 
of  Sparta’s  great  hero,  Pausanias,  whom — guilty  or  not 
guilty  of  the  treason  imputed  to  him — his  countrymen 
had  starved  to  death  in  the  “  Brazen  House  ”  of  Min- 
erva.  There  was  the  case,  too,  of  the  rebel  Helots  who 
had  been  forcibly  dragged  from  the  shrine  of  Heptune 
at  Tsenarus  and  put  to  death — an  act  which  the  Spar¬ 
tans  themselves  confessed  had  been  punished  by  an 
earthquake,  sent  by  the  great  “  Earth -shaker ;  ”  let 
them  now  drive  out  of  their  city  the  families  of  all 
concerned  in  these  notorious  acts  of  sacrilege,  if  they 
would  go  to  war  with  clean  hands. 

The  I.acedsemonians  sent  an  embassy  to  offer  terms 
to  Athens.  If  they  would  raise  the  siege  of  Potidaea 
— if  they  would  restore  the  independence  of  Hfgma — 

A.c.s.s.  voi.  vi.  o 


34 


THUCYDIDES. 


if  they  would  rescind  the  decree  which  excluded  tdl 
Megareans,  on  pain  of  death,  from  Athenian  ports  and 
markets — and  if  they  would  undertake  in  the  future 
to  respect  the  independence  of  the  weaker  allies, — 
then  peace  might  he  still  maintained.  This  was  re¬ 
fused  ;  and  then  they  sent  their  ultimatum,  couched 
in  the  briefest  and  most  haughty  terms — Let  Athens 
declare  the  independence  of  all  the  Greeks,  and  there 
might  yet  he  peace. 

These  terms  were  discussed  in  full  assembly  at 
Athens.  Opinions  were  divided,  until  Pericles,  son  of 
Xanthippus,  “the  foremost  man  in  Athens  at  that  time, 
both  in  eloquence  and  practical  ability,”  came  forward 
and  spoke.  It  may  be  here  observed  that  Thucydides 
gives  us  scarcely  anything  that  can  be  called  a  char¬ 
acter,  or  even  the  briefest  biographical  notice,  of  the 
great  men  who  play  such  important  parts  in  his  history* 
He  introduces  them  to  us,  as  in  this  passage,  in  the 
fewest  possible  words;  and  he  dismia^e^j  them  sometimes 
— notably  in  this  case  of  Pericles— -’^rith  even  less  for¬ 
mality.  This  may  be  partly  owuig  to  the  fact  that  he 
was  writing,  in  the  first  instance,  /ci  a  generation  co¬ 
temporary  with  the  events  he  i./rrates,  and  to  Avhom 
the  characters  in  the  story,  their  personal  history  and 
their  habits  of  life,  were  all  well  known.  But  the 
omission  of  such  notices,  absolutely  necessary  as  they 
are  in  order  to  appreciate  the  influence  of  such  men 
upon  the  domestic  and  foreign  history  of  their  coun¬ 
try,  and  which  the  modern  reader  has  to  gather  as 
he  may  from  other  sources,  is  especially  remarkable 
in  an  author  who  declares  at  the  outset  that  he  is 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


35 


writing  not  for  cotemporaries  only,  but  for  all  pos¬ 
terity. 

Pericles,  of  whom  he  tells  us  at  once  so  much  and 
so  little,  had  now  been  the  virtual  ruler  of  the  Athe¬ 
nian  people  for  above  thirty  years,  and  was  to  hold 
that  position,  with  only  what  may  be  called  accidental 
interruptions,  for  yet  some  few  years  more.  Virtual 
ruler, — for  his  power,  which  was  at  one  period  greater 
than  that  of  any  man  before  or  since  in  Athens,  rested 
only  on  a  tacit  recognition  of  his  supremacy,  and  not 
on  any  legal  or  constitutional  grounds.  He  was  neither 
archon  nor  member  of  the  great  Court  of  Areopagus  : 
he  was  but  a  young  man  of  good  family  who  had 
gained  an  ascendancy  in  the  state,  partly  at  first  by 
the  popularity  and  influence  inherited  from  his  father 
Xanthippus,  but  mainly  by  his  own  consummate  abili¬ 
ties.  His  position  in  the  state  may  be  not  inaptly, 
though  not  quite  accurately,  compared  with  that  of  an 
English  commoner  who,  with  a  good  introduction  to 
public  life,  has  been  raised  by  the  voice  of  the  nation 
to  the  Premiership — and  who  may  at  any  time,  by 
a  sudden  change  in  that  voice,  have  to  retire  into  the 
ranks  again.  All  authorities  are  agreed  in  describing 
the  personal  qualifications  of  Pericles  as  having  been 
remarkable.  In  person  he  was  compared  to  the  god¬ 
like  Peisistratus  :  his  head  was  said  to  be  as  beautiful 
as  that  of  the  statues  of  Bacchus,  or  even  as  Jupiter 
himself — though  his  enemies,  alluding  to  some  slight 
deformity,  said  that  it  must,  then,  be  an  “onion¬ 
headed  ”  Jupiter.  Statesman,  soldier,  and  philosopher, 
a  man  of  highly  cultivnted  tastes  and  varied  accom- 


36 


THUCYDIDES. 


plislunents,  he  represented  well  the  Athens  which  he 
“  had  found  of  brick  and  left  of  marble.”  And,  how¬ 
ever  he  may  be  indebted  to  Thucydides  for  much  of 
the  oratory  put  into  his  mouth  in  this  ‘  History  of 
the  War,’  it  is  certain  that  his  own  eloquence  was  of 
the  most  commanding  order. 

It  was  he  who  now  came  forward  to  urge  upor 
the  wavering  Assembly  an  uncompromising  refusal  of 
the  Peloponnesian  demands,  as  the  only  course  con¬ 
sistent  with  the  honour  of  Athens.  To  arbitration 
they  might  have  consented ;  but  this  was  sheer  dicta¬ 
tion.  “Any  demand  which  an  equal  insists  upon 
enforcing  on  a  neighbour,  before  offering  to  submit 
it  to  arbitration,  means  nothing  more  or  less  than 
subjection,  be  such  demand  great  or  small.”  They  had 
the  advantage  of  their  adversaries  in  wealth,  in  unity 
of  counsels,  and  above  all  in  their  fleet.  Only  let  no 
exasperation  which  they  might  feel  at  the  probable 
devastation  of  their  territory  tempt  them  to  meet  the 
enemy’s  land  forces  in  a  general  engagement :  there, 
they  would  be  no  match  for  them.  Let  them  look 
upon  themselves  in  the  light  of  islanders,  and  guard 
well  the  sea  and  their  capital.  He  foresaw  more 
danger  from  their  own  schemes  of  foreign  conquest  than 
from  the  present  enemy. 

This  warlike  speech  was  received  with  acclamation, 
and  the  Lacedaemonian  ultimatum  rejected.  And  soon 
the  war  began  in  earnest,  though  as  yet  hostile  opera¬ 
tions  were  strictly  local.  The  town  of  Plataea  lay 
within  the  territory  of  Boeotia,  of  which  Thebes  was 
the  leading  state  :  but  ever  since  the  great  day  of 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


37 


the  battle  to  which  it  gave  its  name,  it  had  continued 
the  faithful  and  honoured  ally  of  Athens,  but  with 
its  independence  guaranteed  by  the  national  gratitude 
of  all  the  Greek  states.  But  it  was  only  natural  that 
the  Thebans  should  have  been  always  jealous  of  this 
little  “state  within  a  state;”  especially  since  the  fact 
of  this  independence  and  alliance  with  Athens  was 
a  standing  memorial  of  Theban  weakness — or  worse 
— in  betraying  the  interest  of  Greece  in  her  struggle 
with  Persia.  An  attempt  was  now  made  by  Thebes 
to  detach  Plataea  forcibly  from  the  Athenian  protec¬ 
torate,  and  absorb  it  into  the  Boeotian  league.  A 
party  of  three  hundred  Thebans,  admitted  under  cover 
of  night  by  some  friends  within,  tried  to  make  them¬ 
selves  masters  of  the  place  :  they  failed,  the  majority 
were  taken  prisoners,  and  put  to  death  in  cold  blood. 
The  cruelty  was  nothing  very  exceptional  in  those 
times;  but  in  this  particular  case,  a  breach  of  faith 
was  alleged  against  the  men  of  Plataea,  and  the 
Athenians  (to  whom,  on  the  first  alarm,  an  appeal 
for  aid  had  been  despatched)  had  even  sent  —  too 
late — to  desire  that  the  prisoners  might  not  be  dealt 
with  till  their  arrival.  They  at  once  garrisoned  the 
to^vn,  as  a  siege  by  the  enraged  Thebans  was  im¬ 
minent. 

Both  confederacies  now  prepared  for  a  war  whose 
area  and  proportions  none  could  undertake  to  limit. 
The  Peloponnesian  Greeks  even  thought  of  sending  to 
ask  aid  of  the  national  enemy — “the  King,”  as  the 
Persian  monarch  was  always  termed  by  those  who 
had  little  acquaintance  with  monarchies.  Thucydides 


38 


THUCYDIDES. 


dtiscribes  the  intense  expectation  which  prevailed 
throughout  peninsular  and  continental  Greece : — 

“1^0  operations  on  a  small  scale  Were  in  the  thought 
of  either  party,  hut  they  braced  themselves  for  war 
in  earnest.  And  not  unnaturally ;  for  men  are  always 
most  eager  at  starting,  and  at  that  date  there  was  a 
large  body  of  youth  growing  up  in  the  Peloponnese, 
and  in  Athens  too,  who  took  to  war  enthusiastically, 
as  having  had  no  experience  of  it.  And  all  the  rest 
of  Greece  looked  on  in  anxious  expectation  at  this 
conflict  between  its  two  principal  states.  Many  pro¬ 
phecies  were  quoted,  and  the  soothsayers  gave  out  a 
great  many  oracular  verses,  both  in  the  states  which 
were  going  to  war  and  in  the  others.  There  had  been 
an  earthquake  in  Delos,  moreover,  a  little  before, 
though  the  island  had  never  previously  felt  a  shock 
within  the  memory  of  the  Greeks ;  and  this  was  said 
— and  indeed  it  so  seemed — to  be  a  warning  of  what 
was  to  happen.  And  anything  else  of  the  kind 
which  took  place  was  all  hunted  up  for  the  occasion. 
The  public  feeling  all  ran  in  favour  of  the  Lacedae¬ 
monians,  especially  as  they  gave  themselves  out  as  the 
liberators  of  Greece.  Individuals  and  states  alike, 
all  did  their  best  to  help  them,  both  by  word  and 
deed,  in  every  way  they  could:  and  every  one  thought 
matters  were  going  all  wrong  where  he  could  not  be 
present  in  person.  So  exasperated  were  almost  all 
of  them  against  the  Athenians,  some  from  the  desire 
to  be  freed  from  their  rule,  others  from  fear  of  being 
brought  under  it.” — (II.  8.)  And  they  all  thought, 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


39 


as  the  writer  tells  us  in  a  later  part  of  his  work,*  that 
two  or  three  campaigns  at  most  would  see  the  end 
of  that  hated  dominion,  if  the  allied  troops  ravaged, 
as  they  could  easily  do,  her  territory  season  after 
season. 

Is  it  because  Athens  appears  to  have  been  thus 
singly  matched  against  almost  all  Greece  in  arms,  or 
is  it  from  an  unconscious  sympathy  with  the  Athe¬ 
nian  historian,  fairly  impartial  as  he  is  acknowledged 
to  be — or  because  of  the  final  result  of  the  struggle, 
or  from  something  of  that  “  insularity  ”  of  feeling 
in  ourselves  which  Pericles  tried  to  impress  on  his 
countrymen, — that  as  we  read,  we  nearly  all  of  us 
become  partisans  cf  Athens! 

Two-thirds  of  the  regular  contingent  from  each  of 
the  Peloponnesian  confederates  were  under  orders  to 
assemble  at  the  Isthmus  for  an  invasion  of  Attica, 
where  they  were  briefly  harangued  by  the  Spartan 
king  Archidamus.  A  herald  was  sent  in  the  last 
resort  to  Athens,  but  was  escorted  back  to  the  fron¬ 
tier  that  same  evening  without  an  audience, — “  the 
Athenians  would  listen  to  an  envoy  when  the  enemy 
had  quitted  their  soil.”  He  turned  to  his  escort,  as 
he  crossed  the  border,  with  the  ominous  words,  adapted 
from  the  great  national  poet, — “  This  day  will  be  the 
beginning  of  much  woe  to  the  Greeks.”! 

Archidamus,  after  aU,  proceeded  with  almost  more 
than  Spartan  caution ;  dilatoriness,  many  of  his  allies 
called  it.  The  real  explanation,  as  Thucydides  thinks, 
was  that  he  still  believed  that,  in  view  of  the  imme- 
*  VII.  28.  t  Homer,  Iliad,  I.  2 


40 


THUCYDIDES. 


diate  ravaging  of  their  lands,  the  Athenians  wonld 
give  way.  He  wasted  precious  time  before  the  little 
stronghold  of  CEnoe,  waiting  for  some  message  to  this 
effect.  They  had  no  such  thought ;  or,  if  any  of  them 
had,  they  were  overborne  by  the  strong  sphit  of 
Pericles.  He  laid  before  them  the  statistics  of  their 
resources :  a  yearly  income  from  the  tribute  paid  by 
the  allies  of  say  <£140,000;  a  reserve  in  the  Acropolis 
of  a  million  and  a  quarter;  in  public  possessions  of 
uncoined  gold  and  silver,  something  like  £130,000. 
A  very  small  revenue  in  the  eyes  of  a  modern  finan¬ 
cier,  but  doubtless  considerable  for  a  Greek  state  in 
those  early  times.  Their  army — including  what  we 
should  call  the  ‘‘  reserve  ”  forces,  fit  only  for  garrison 
duty — amounted  to  barely  32,000.  A  small  German 
principality  in  our  own  times  would  have  boasted  a 
larger  force.  But  we  must  remember  that  this  estimate 
may  safely  be  doubled  in  the  actual  number  of  men; 
for  each  heavy-armed  foot-soldier  had  his  shield-bearer, 
and  each  horseman  his  groom.  Military  strength  is 
relative,  in  aU  ages;  and  perhaps  no  modern  state 
maintains  so  large  a  force,  in  proportion  to  its  popula¬ 
tion,  as  Athens  at  this  time.  They  had  a  fleet  of  300 
war-galleys  (each  carrying  about  300  men),  and  on 
those  they  chiefly  depended.* 

The  Athenian  rural  population  prepared  at  once  to 
quit  their  farms  and  homesteads,  and  abandon  to  the 
invader  all  the  property  which  could  not  be  carried 
away.  Their  cattle  and  sheep  they  sent  across  to 

*  The  population  of  Athens  at  this  period  has  been  esti¬ 
mated  roughly  at  600,000.  She  had  something  like  60,000 
men,  in  all,  on  foreign  service  in  the  early  part  of  the  war. 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


.41 


Euboea  and  the  adjacent  islands;  their  wives  and 
children,  their  portable  chattels — even  the  framework 
of  their  houses — they  carried  with  them  into  the  city. 
How  far  this  was  an  act  of  national  self-devotion,  so 
far  as  the  masses  were  concerned,  or  how  far  they 
acted  under  a  kind  of  moral  compulsion  from  Pericles 
and  the  more  powerful  and  influential  urban  residents, 
it  is  impossible  to  say.  There  is  abundant  evidence 
that  it  was  a  grievous  trial.  “  They  had  been  accus¬ 
tomed  always  to  a  country  life,  much  more  than  the 
other  Greeks,”  says  our  historian ;  “  they  suffered  great 
hardship  in  the  removal,  especially  as  they  had  but 
lately  restored  their  tenements  after  the  Persian 
war.” 


“  They  went  with  heavy  hearts,  and  took  it  hard  to 
have  to  leave  their  homes  and  holy  places,  which  had  be¬ 
longed  to  their  fathers  before  them,  time  out  of  mind, 
under  the  old  constitution ;  having  to  change  all  their 
habits  of  life,  and  thus  to  leave  what  was  to  each  one 
of  them  nothing  less  than  their  native  country.  And 
when  they  had  got  into  the  city,  some  few  had  houses 
there,  or  found  refuge  with  friends  or  relatives ;  but 
the  great  number  of  them  had  to  seek  quarters  in  the 
vacant  parts  of  the  city,  and  in  the  precincts  of  temples 

and  shrines  of  heroes,  except  the  Acropolis  and  the 
•»> 

temple  of  Eleusinian  Ceres,  and  other  places  that  were 
rigidly  closed.”  CL  16,  17.) 

*  For  some  humorous  details  of  the  shifts  to  which  the  new¬ 
comers  were  reduced,  the  reader  may  refer  to  the  “  Knights  ’  of 
Aristophanes,  where  some  are  represented  as  liaving  to  take  up 
their  abode  in  hen-coops  and  pigeon-holes. 


42 


TUUCYDIDES. 


One  forbidden  portion  of  ground  was  built  upon  by 
these  new  immigrants,  in  spite  of  the  warning  of  an 
ancient  oracle  that  “the  Pelasgicon  were  best  unin¬ 
habited.”  This  is  the  only  instance,  except  that  of  an 
old  prediction  popularly  quoted  at  the  beginning  of 
this  war, — that  it  should  last  thrice  nine  years,* — in 
which  the  writer  seems  to  admit  any  genuine  corre¬ 
spondence  between  the  prediction  and  the  event ;  and 
even  here  he  philosophically  traces  the  result  not  to 
the  occupation  of  forbidden  ground,  but  to  the  gen¬ 
eral  overcrowding. 

It  was  nearly  three  months  after  the  failure  of  the  , 
Thebans  at  Platsea  that  Archidamus  led  his  forces  into 
Athenian  territory;  and  by  that  time  the  country  people 
had  seciu'od  all  their  movable  property  within  the  city 
walls.  But  the  corn  was  just  ripe,  and  the  crop  of 
olives  coming  on,  and  all  were  destroyed,  almost  within 
sight  of  the  owners.  The  invaders  lingered  some  time 
in  the  district  of  Acharnse,  less  than  eight  miles  from 
Athens,  in  the  hope  either  of  drawing  out  the  Athenian 
forces  to  defend  one  of  their  richest  and  strongest  out- 
settlements,  or  of  driving  the  Acharnians  themselves  to 
disaffection,  when  they  saw  the  apparent  apathy  shown 
by  their  countrymen  to  their  personal  sufferings.  But 
Pericles  held  the  Athenians  well  in  hand.  Though  the 
younger  men  chafed  and  clamoured  to  be  led  into 
the  field,  he  would  not  permit  an  Assembly  to  be 
called  even  to  deliberate  on  the  question  of  marching 
out,  and  was  content  to  hear  himself  now  called  “  the 
author  of  all  their  calamities.”  It  was  not  till  their 


*  V.  26. 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


43 


commissariat  failed  that  the  invading  force  withdrew, 
and  disbanded  to  their  several  cities. 

The  Athenians  in  their  turn  entered  upon  the 
aggressive,  sending  a  powerful  fleet  of  a  hundred  and 
fifty  galleys  to  make  descents  upon  the  coast  of  the 
peninsula.  Amongst  other  places  they  attacked  the 
strong  position  at  Methone  (Modon),  on  the  south¬ 
west  corner  of  Laconia,  hut  which  was  at  this  time 
hut  weakly  fortified  and  garrisoned.  But  a  Lacedae¬ 
monian  officer  happened  to  he  in  the  neighbourhood 
who  was  to  play  a  short  hut  brilliant  part  in  this  war; 
who  was  soon  to  he  personally  matched  in  the  field 
against  Thucydides  himself;  and  whose  conduct  was 
to  have  no  little  influence  on  the  historian’s  future 
fortunes.  Brasidas, — the  favourite  hero  of  one  of  our 
most  successful  students  of  ancient  history,  Arnold  of 
Rugby — and  who  seems  a  favourite  with  Thucydides 
also,  so  far  as  that  feeling  can  he  said  to  exist  in  his 
cold  judgment, — Brasidas  cut  his  way  with  a  hundred 
men  through  the  besiegers,  and  saved  the  place ;  the 
first  man,  says  Thucydides,  who  received  the  public 
thanks  of  Sparta  (not  much  given  to  such  recognitions) 
for  good  service  in  this  war.  The  Athenians  took 
signal  vengeance  on  the  islanders  of  .^gina,  whose 
demand  for  independence  they  regarded  as  one  of  the 
chief  causes  of  the  war.  They  cleared  them  all  off, 
and  settled  the  island  with  colonists  of  their  own ;  and 
the  unfortunate  natives  had  to  migrate  into  a  territory 
assigned  them  by  the  Lacedaemonians  on  the  frontier 
between  themselves  and  that  of  Argolis.  The  other 
hated  neighbour  of  Athens,  Megara,  was  swept  by  an 


44 


THUCYDIDES. 


overwlielming  land  and  sea  force  under  Pericles  in 
person;  and  for  some  years  afterwards  the  visit  was 
repeated  by  the  Athenians  year  by  year,  as  regularly 
as  the  enemy’s  forces  made  their  raid  upon  the  corn¬ 
fields  and  olive-grounds  of  Attica. 

Early  in  the  winter  of  this  year,  at  the  close  of  the 
campaign,  the  Athenians  held  their  public  funeral  of 
those  citizens  who  had  fallen  in  the  war.  It  was  a 
striking  national  ceremony,  probably  dating  as  far 
hack  as  the  close  of  the  great  Persian  wars.  Here 
is  the  description  of  it ; — 


They  lay  out  the  hones  of  the  slain  three  days 
previously  in  a  tent  erected  for  the  purpose,  and  each 
family  bring  for  their  own  dead  any  offering  they 
please.  When  the  time  comes  for  carrying  them 
forth  to  burial,  sarcophagi  made  of  cypress-wood  are 
placed  on  cars,  one  for  each  tri))e;  in  these  are  laid 
the  hones  of  each  man,  according  to  the  tribe  to  which 
he  belonged;  and  one  hier  is  carried  empty,  spread 
with  funeral  garments,  for  the  missing,  whose  hones 
could  not  he  collected  to  be  brought  home.  Any  one 
who  will,  citizen  or  sojourner,  joins  in  the  procession ; 
and  the  women  of  the  family  are  present  at  the  funeral, 
to  make  their  lament  for  the  dead.  So  they  lay  them 
in  the  public  cemetery,  which  is  in  the  fairest  suburb 
of  the  city ;  and  there  do  they  always  bury  those  who 
fait  in  battle,  excepting  those  who  died  at  Marathon 
>  heroes  they  buried  there,  where  they  fell,  as 
thci^.  valour  to  have  been  exceptional.  And 

when  they.laydihem  in  the  ground,  some  citizen  selected 

■  ^  -4  ’ 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


45 


by  the  state,  as  of  proved  ability  and  distinguished 
reputation,  pronounces  over  them  a  fitting  panegyric ; 
after  which  all  withdraw.  In  such  fashion  do  they 
bury  them ;  and  all  through  this  war,  whenever  they 
had  the  opportunity,  they  observed  this  custom.” — 
(II.  34.) 


The  speaker  chosen  on  this  occasion  was  Pericles 
himself.  We  know,  from  other  sources,  that  he  had 
performed  this  duty  at  least  once  before — after  the 
reduction  of  Samos.  He  now  mounted  the  platform 
arranged  for  the  purpose,  so  that  his  voice  might  be 
heard  as  far  as  possible  by  the  assembled  multitude, 
and  delivered  an  oration  which,  as  it  stands  in  the 
pages  of  Thucydides,  is  admitted  to  be  one  of  the 
finest  of  those  grand  rhetorical  declamations  which 
were  the  glory  of  Athenian  orators  and  the  delight  of 
their  audience.  The  arrangement  and  structure  of  the 
sentences,  and  much  of  the  language,  are  no  doubt  the 
historian’s  own.  But  it  may  be  safely  assumed  that 
he  was  present  at  the  delivery,  that  his  admiration  of 
the  speaker  would  have  held  him  in  rapt  attention, 
and  that  his  preconceived  determination  to  become  the 
historian  of  the  war  would  lead  him  to  preserve  as 
much  as  possible  both  of  the  argument  and  the  lan¬ 
guage — possibly  in  the  shape  of  notes,  certainly  from 
his  own  recollection  and  that  of  others.  And 
it  must  be  allowed,  is  always  most  retent^e' 
written  records  are  scarce.  We  are  told,  indebd|;^ 
may  trust  the  authority  of  Cicero,  whose 
rest  upon  accurate  tradition,  that  Peri^s  wrot^  hk 


46 


THUCYDIDES. 


speeclies.  If  tliis  were  the  case,  the  historian  might 
have  had  in  his  hands  a  copy.  The  speaker  begins  hy 
declaring  that  no  words — certainly  not  Ms  words — can 
do  justice  to  the  actions  of  the  dead ;  they  are  beyond 
all  praise  of  men.  Nor  will  he  dwell  now  on  that 
well-worn  topic,  the  glories  of  their  ancestors.  He  will 
speak  rather  of  their  internal  polity. 

“  First,  let  me  set  forth,  before  I  proceed  with  my 
oration,  what  has  been  the  course  of  training  hy  which 
we  gained  our  present  position,  and  what  the  political 
constitution  and  habits  of  life  which  have  made  our 
greatness.  For  I  think  this  is  a  topic  not  unbefitting 
the  occasion,  and  one  which  this  whole  assembly, 
citizens  and  strangers  alike,  will  do  well  to  listen  to. 

“  The  constitution  we  enjoy  is  no  imitation  from  our 
neighbours — we  claim  to  he  rather  a  model  to  others 
than  a  copy  from  them.  It  hears  the  name  of  democracy, 
because  our  institutions  are  for  the  good  of  the  many, 
not  of  the  few.  In  the  matter  of  legal  rights,  every 
man  stands  on  the  same  footing  in  all  private  suits  in 
our  courts :  in  the  matter  of  position  and  reputation, 
according  as  a  man  distinguishes  himself  in  any  line  of 
life,  so  he  rises  to  public  honours,  not  by  social  caste 
BO  much  as  by  merit.  Nor  is  any  man  excluded  on  the 
ground  of  poverty,  by  the  obscurity  of  his  rank,  so  he 
be  able  to  do  the  state  good  service.  As  we  live  under 
froe  institutions  in  our  public  life,  so  in  our  private 
daily  intercourse  with  each  other  we  cultivate  no  spirit 
of  jealousy,  nor  quarrel  with  our  neighbour  because  he 
follows  his  own  tastes,  nor  cast  looks  at  him  intended 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


47 


to  annoy  if  they  cannot  punish.  While  Ave  thus  prao 
tise  forbearance  in  private  intercourse,  in  public  matters 
we  have  a  thorough  fear  of  licence,  hearkening  to  the 
constituted  authorities  and  to  the  laws,  especially  such 
as  are  ordained  for  the  protection  of  the  injured,  and 
to  those  which,  though  never  formally  enacted,  all  men 
hold  it  shame  to  violate. 

“  Yet  amidst  our  graver  occupations  Ave  provide 
abundant  relaxation  for  the  spirits,  in  the  public  games 
and  sacrifices  Avhich  we  hold  year  by  year,  and  in  the 
splendour  of  our  private  establishments,  in  the  daily 
enjoyment  of  Avhich  we  banish  care.  And  because  of 
the  greatness  of  this  our  city,  all  abundance  from  all 
lands  comes  in  to  us  ;  and  it  is  our  happy  lot  to  enjoy 
the  good  things  of  foreigners  not  less  familiarly  than 
the  products  of  our  OAvn  soil. 

‘‘  In  our  military  training  we  present  a  contrast  to  our 
opponents  in  these  points.  We  throw  our  city  open 
to  all  the  world.  AYe  have  no  regulations  Avhich 
exclude  the  foreigner  from  full  investigation  and  in¬ 
spection,  for  fear  lest  an  enemy  may  profit  by  the 
knowledge ;  *  for  we  trust  not  so  much  to  crafty  pre¬ 
cautions  as  to  our  intrinsic  valour  in  action.  In  our 
educational  training,  while  some  nations  aim  at  forming 
a  warlike  spirit  by  laborious  discipline  from  the  earli¬ 
est  years,  we,  with  all  our  easy  life,  can  face  dangers 
as  great,  and  as  boldly,  as  they  can.  The  facts  proA^e 
it :  the  Lacedaimonians  never  venture  on  an  expedition 
against  our  territory  Avith  a  division  only  of  their  army, 

*  Refeiring  to  the  Alien  Acts  (if  they  may  be  so  termed) 
by  wliich  Sparta,  jealously  guarded  herself. 


48 


THUCYDIDES. 


but  with  their  whole  force ;  but  when  we  Atheniani? 
unsupported  invade,  our  neighbours’  territory,  we  com¬ 
monly  get  the  best  of  it,  and  that  easily,  though  on  a 
hostile  soil  and  against  men  who  are  fighting  for  their 
homes.  Indeed,  our  collective  force  no  enemy  has  ever 
yet  engaged,  because  we  have  at  once  to  maintain  our 
naval  armament  and  to  despatch  our  troops  to  so  many 
different  quarters  on  land.  But  whenever  they  engage 
a  division  of  our  army,  if  they  beat  a  detachment  they 
claim  to  have  repulsed  our  whole  force,  and  to  have 
been  defeated  by  our  whole  force  if  they  get  the  worst 
of  it.  And  surely,  if  we  are  willing  to  face  the  perils  of 
war  out  of  our  careless  ease  rather  than  after  a  painful 
training,  and  with  a  courage  that  springs  from  character 
rather  than  from  regulation,  we  have  this  advantage  : 
we  never  distress  ourselves  beforehand  about  perils  to 
come,  yet  we  show  ourselves,  when  we  have  to  face 
them,  fully  as  brave  as  others  who  are  always  toiling. 

“  I  say  our  state  is  to  be  admired  for  this,  and  yet 
for  more  than  this.  We  cultivate  refinement  without 
extravagance,  and  philosophy  without  effeminacy ;  we 
value  wealth  for  its  practical  advantages,  not  as  a  thing 
for  boastful  display ;  and  it  is  not  the  confession  of 
poverty  that  we  hold  disgraceful,  but  rather  the  not 
setting  ourselves  to  work  to  escape  from  it. 

“  With  us,  men  are  expected  to  attend  to  their  public 
as  well  as  to  their  private  duties ;  even  those  engaged 
in  manual  labour  have  a  competent  knowledge  of  polit¬ 
ical  questions ;  and  we  alone,  if  a  man  takes  no  part  in 
such  questions,  instead  of  excusing  him  as  being  ‘  no 
meddler,’  despise  him  as  being  no  good  citizen.  As  a 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


40 


body,  we  can  all  judge,  of  public  measures  at  least,  if 
we  cannot  originate  them ;  and  we  do  not  hold  that 
discussion  hinders  action,  but  that  the  greater  hindrance 
is  not  to  have  discussed  and  understood  a  measure 
b-.fore  we  have  to  carry  it  out.  For  I  consider  we 
possess  in  an  eminent  degree  this  characteristic, — we 
are  at  once  bold  in  conception  and  careful  in  the  calcu¬ 
lation  of  our  plans;  whereas  in  general,  ignorance  leads 
men  to  venture,  while  calculation  makes  them  hesitate. 
And  those  may  be  rightly  adjudged  most  courageous  in 
spirit,  who,  with  the  fullest, appreciation  of  all  that  is 
pleasant  as  well  as  all  that  is  hard,  yet  never  for  that 
reason  shrink  from  danger.  In  our  estimate  of  merit, 
too,  we  differ  from  the  world  in  general ;  we  make  our 
friends  not  by  receiving  benefits  but  by  conferring 
them.  Th'e  party  who  confers  a  kindness  is  like  to 
prove  the  more  constant  friend  :  he  seeks  by  kindness 
to  keep  alive  the  sense  of  obligation  in  the  party 
benefited ;  while  he  who  lies  under  the  obligation  is 
not  so  eager  about  it,  feeling  that  all  he  does  in  return 
will  be  reckoned  matter  of  debt  and  not  of  favour. 
And  we  are  the  only  people  who  unhesitatingly  give 
aid  where  needed,  not  so  much  from  ealculations  of  in¬ 
terest  as  from  the  confidence  of  a  liberal  spirit. 

I  assert,  in  short,  that  our  whole  polity  is  a  school 
for  Greece;  while,  if  we  come  to  individuals,  it  is 
amongst  us  that  the  same  man  shows  all  personal 
qualifications  for  the  most  varied  parts  in  life,  with  the 
most  accomplished  versatility.  That  this  is  no  mere 
vaimting  talk  for  the  occasion,  but  the  simple  truth 
of  facts,  the  very  power  which  this  state  enjoys,  and 
A.C.S.S.  vol.  vi.  D 


50 


THUCYDIDES. 


which  it  has  reached  through  such  a  line  of  conduct, 
gives  proof  enough.  For  ours  is  the  only  state  which, 
when  brought  to  the  test,  rises  higher  than  its  reputa¬ 
tion  ;  the  only  one  which  leaves  an  invading  enemy  no 
mortification  at  having  been  worsted  at  such  hands,  and 
gives  no  subject  room  to  complain  that  he  is  governed 
by  unworthy  masters.  AVe  have  given  abundant 
justification  for  our  supremacy:  we  have  not  left  our¬ 
selves  without  witness ;  we  shall  win  the  admiration 
both  of  our  o-wn  and  future  generations.  We  need  no 
Homer  to  praise  us,  nor  any  poet  to  charm  by  his  verse 
for  the  moment,  whilst  plain  facts  will  afterwards 
belie  the  impression  thus  formed  of  our  deeds.  AVe 
shall  have  made  every  sea  and  every  shore  accessible 
to  our  daring,  and  shall  have  founded  everywhere  im¬ 
perishable  memorials  of  our  power  alike  to  benefit  and 
to  punish.  Such  is  the  state  for  which  our  friends 
have  fought  and  died,  determined  that  she  should  never 
be  wrested  from  them :  and  we  their  survivors  will 
surely  be  ready,  every  one  of  us,  to  suffer  for  her 
too.”— (II.  36-41.) 

This  public  funeral  must,  from  the  necessity  of 
things,  have  been  rather  a  commemorative  service  for 
those  who  had  fallen  in  battle,  in  the  majority  of 
cases,  than  an  actual  mterment  of  their  ashes.  Few 
comparatively  were  the  cases  in  which  the  remains 
of  the  slain  could  in  any  shape  have  been  brought 
back  to  Athens.  The  very  boast  of  the  orabu, 
that  every  known  sea  and  shore  bore  witness  to 


OUTBREAK  OF  HOSTILITIES. 


51 


Athenian  enterprise,  tells  where  she  had  burred  her 
dead ; — 

“  Their  graves  were  severed  far  and  wide, 

By  mount,  and  stream,  and  sea.” 

The  orator  makes  use  of  this  fact  as  he  goes  on. 

“  They  gave  their  lives  for  their  country,  and  gained 
for  themselves  a  glory  that  can  never  fade,  a  tomb 
that  shall  stand  as  a  mark  for  ever.  I  do  not  mean 
that  in  which  their  bodies  lie,  but  that  in  which  their 
renown  lives  after  them,  to  be  remembered  for  ever  on 
every  occasion  of  speech  or  action  which  calls  it  to 
mind.  For  the  whole  earth  is  the  grave  and  mon¬ 
ument  of  heroes ;  it  is  not  the  mere  graving  upon 
marble  in  their  native  land  which  sets  forth  their  deeds, 
but  even  in  lands  where  they  were  strangers,  there  lives 
an  unwritten  record  in  every  heart,  felt  though  never 
embodied.” 

The  orator  concludes  with  words  of  condolence  for 
the  sorrowing  relatives.  They  do  not  rise  perhaps 
much  above  the  unavoidable  commonplace  of  all  con¬ 
dolences,  and  are  not  free  from  the  artificial  rhetoric 
which  he  and  his  hearers  loved.  Yet  there  are  fine 
touches  here  and  there. 

“  I  call  those  fortunate  whose  death,  like  theirs,  or 
whose  sorrow,  like  yours,  has  the  fullest  portion  of 
honour,  and  whose  end  comes  at  the  moment  they  are 
happiest.  Yet  I  feel  how  hard  it  is  to  persuade  you 


52 


THUCYDIDES. 


of  this,  when  in  the  triumphs  of  their  comrades— 
triumphs  in  which  you  once  used  to  rejoice — you  will  so 
oft^n  be  reminded  of  those  you  have  lost :  and  sorrow 
is  felt  not  for  the  blessings  we  have  never  tasted,  but 
for  those  to  which  we  have  been  accustomed  and  of 
which  we  are  deprived.  .  .  . 

“  i\.nd  for  you,  their  children  or  their  brothetrs  who 
are  here  present,  I  see  an  arduous  struggle  before  you. 
Eor  all  are  wont  to  praise  those  who  are  no  more,  and 
hardly,  even  though  your  own  deserts  be  extraordinary, 
will  you  be  held  to  have  equalled  or  approached  theirs. 
There  is  ever  a  jealousy  of  the  living,  as  rivals ;  it  is  ' 
only  those  who  stand  no  longer  in  our  path  that  we 
honour  with  an  ungrudging  affection.” — (II.  44,  45.) 

So,  with  the  promise  that  the  orphans  of  those  who 
had  fallen  should  be  regarded  as  the  children  of  the 
state,  to  be  educated  and  maintained  at  the  public  cost, 
Pericles  dismisses  the  assembly.  The  winter  had  now 
set  in,  and  this  public  funeral  marks  the  close  of  the 
first  year  of  the  war. 


\ 

CHAPTEK  V. 

THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 

.  y  *  » 

The  second  summer  of  the  war  began  miserably  for 
Ath(}ns.  The  Pelopoimesians  in  full  force  invaded  the 
coimtry  a  second  time  on  the  west  and  north,  and  for 
forty  days  cut,  burned,  and  destroyed  far  more  exten¬ 
sively  and  completely  than  in  their  former  raid.  They 
had  lost  all  fear  of  interruption  from  the  Athenian 
forces,  who  kept  within  their  walls  as  formerly,  in 
accordance  with  the  policy  of  Pericles.  But  before 
they  had  been  many  days  in  the  country,  a  far  more 
terrible  enemy  had  made  its  appearance  there,  which 
was  lilcely  to  spare  neither  of  the  parties  in  the  con¬ 
test,  and. whose  presence,  as  soon  as  it  was  fully  re¬ 
cognised,  made  the  invaders  hastily  mthdraw. 

A  pestilence  broke  out  in  the  overcrowded  streets 
and  suburbs  of  Athens.  Whatever  it  was — and  its 
exact  identification  seems  impossible — it  was  said  to 
have  begun  in  Ethiopia,  and  after  passing  through 
Libya,  and  thence  through  a  great  part  of  the  Persian 
empire,  to  have  crossed  the  Archipelago,  visiting  espe¬ 
cially  the  island  of  Lemnos,  and  so  to  have  been 
conveyed,  by  the  usual  channel  of  some  merchant 


54 


THUCYDIDES. 


trader,  to  the  harbour  of  Piraeus,  which  was  the 
quarter  where  it  first  broke  out  within  the  Athenian 
walls.  At  once  there  arose  the  cry — to  he  repeated 
so  often  in  subsequent  history — that  the  enemy  had 
“  poisoned  the  wells.”  That  in  a  city  crowded  beyond 
all  sanitary  rules,  the  wells,  or  rather  tanks,  were 
“poisoned”  is  highly  probable  —  hut  hardly  by  the 
Peloponnesians.  Prom  the  description  given  here  by 
Thucydides,  the  disease  appears  to  have  been  a  viru¬ 
lent  eruptive  fever — of  what  precise  type  it  is  impos¬ 
sible  to  say.*  The  historian  was  himself  attacked 
by  it,  and  had  also,  he  tells  us,  watched  the  cases  of 
other  sufferers.  The  careful  details  which  he  has  set 
down  of  the  symptoms  and  general  course  of  the 
disease  are  considered,  by  competent  medical  author¬ 
ities,  remarkable  for  their  clearness  and  intelligence, 
when  we  take  into  account  not  only  the  very  imper¬ 
fect  state  of  medical  science,  hut  the  fact  that  the 
writer  cannot  he  supposed  to  have  had  any  techni¬ 
cal  knowledge  in  such  matters.  Pemarkahle,  too,  is 
the  calm  practical  foresight  which  led  him  to  note  the 
particulars,  in  order  that,  as  he  says,  by  reference  to 
them  it  might  he  possible  to  recognise  the  disease  in 
case  of  its  recurrence. 

“  That  year,  as  was  generally  remarked,  was  particu¬ 
larly  free  from  cases  of  ordinary  sickness ;  and  if  any 

*  M.  Littr^,  in  his  Introduction  to  the  works  of  Hippocrates 
(tome  i.  p.  122),  pronounces  it  to  have  been  “an  eruptive  fever, 
differing  from  smallpox,  and  now  extinct.” — See  Grote,  Hist, 
of  Greece,  iv.  278,  note. 


TUE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENE. 


55 


one  liad  been  suffering  from  a  previous  attack  of  any 
kind,  all  such  cases  terminated  in  this.  But  in  general 
persons  were  attacked  by  it  suddenly,  while  in  full 
health,  without  ostensible  cause.  First  they  were 
seized  with  violent  flushings  about  the  head,  and  red¬ 
ness  and  turgescence  of  the  eyes;  within,  the  fauces 
and  the  tongue  became  all  at  once  blood-red,  and 
the  breath  unnatural  and  fetid.  After  this  came  on 
sneezing  and  hoarseness ;  and  in  a  short  time  the 
suffering  extended  down  into  the  chest,  with  violent 
cough ;  and  when  it  settled  on  the  heart,  it  disturbed 
its  action,  and  produced  bilious  discharges  of  all  kinds 
known  to  medical  language,  accompanied  by  great 
distress.*  In  most  cases  a  dry  hiccup  came  on,  causing 
violent  spasms,  which  sometimes  ceased  soon,  and  in 
other  cases  lasted  a  long  time.  The  surface  of  the 
body  was  neither  very  hot  to  the  touch  nor  pallid,  but 
rather  red,  livid,  and  covered  with  an  eruption  of 
small  blisters  and  sores ;  while  the  internal  heat  was 
so  great,  that  the  patients  could  not  bear  upon  them 
the  thinnest  garment  or  the  finest  linen,  or  to  lie  any 
other  way  than  naked,  and  had  a  longing  to  throw 
themselves  into  cold  water.  Nay,  many  who  were  not 
carefully  watched  actually  did  so,  into  the  tanks,  urged 
by  an  insatiable  thirst ;  and  it  made  no  difference  what 
they  drank,  much  or  little.  They  suffered  severely  from 
a  distressing  restlessnesS*‘and  want  of  sleep  through- 

*  It  is  difficult  to  ascertain  the  exact  meaning  of  the  quasi 
medical  words  used  in  this  passage  by  Thucydides ;  far  more 
difficult  tlian  it  would  be  in  a  medical  writer,  such  as  Hippo¬ 
crates. 


THUCYDIDES. 


5G 

out.  Yet  during  the  whole  time  the  disease  was  at 
its  height,  the  body  was  not  sensibly  emaciated,  hut 
held  out  against  all  this  suffering  in  a  way  be¬ 
yond  belief ;  so  that  most  died  about  the  seventh  or 
ninth  day,  of  inward  fever,  still  retaining  considerable 
strength.  Or,  if  they  survived  this  crisis,  when  the 
disease  passed  into  the  abdomen,  severe  ulceration 
supervening,  with  profuse  diarrhoea,  the  majority  died 
of  this  last,  from  sheer  exhaustion.  For  the  disease; 
which  had  its  first  seat  in  the  head,  passed  doAvn 
gradually  through  the  whole  body ;  and  if  any  one  got 
through  the  worst  stages,  it  was  apt  to  leave  its 
marks  upon  him  by  seizing  the  extremities,  for  it 
lighted  on  the  fingers  and  toes;  and  many  only 
escaped  with  the  loss  of  these,  and,  in  some  few  cases, 
of  their  eyes  as  well.  Some,  when  they  rose  from 
their  sick-bed,  had.  lost  all  at  once  their  recollection 
of  everything,  and  did  not  even  know  who  they  were, 
or  recognise  their  nearest  friends. 

“For  the  character  of  this  disease  was  terrible 
beyond  description :  and  it  attacked  its  victims  in  a 
way  which  human  nature  could  not  endure.  And 
one  point  in  which  it  showed  itself  distinct  from  all 
known  maladies  was  this — that  the  birds  and  beasts 
which  commonly  prey  on  human  bodies,  either  refused 
to  touch  the  many  dead  who  lay  unburied,  or,  if  they 
tasted  them,  died.  As  a  proof  of  this,  there  was  a 
remarkable  disappearance  of  such  birds  of  prey,  and 
they  were  not  seen  either  about  these  places  or  any¬ 
where  else :  but  the  dogs,  owing  to  their  domestica- 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


57. 


tion,  afforded  a  better  opportunity  of  noting  the  result . 
in  such  cases.* 

•  ••••• 

“  Some  of  the  sufferers  died  untended,  and  some 
after  receiving  all  care  and  medical  treatment.  And 
then  was  no  one  approved  mode  of  treatment,  so  to 
speak  which  could  be  had  recourse  to  in  the  hope  of 
benefit ;  for  what  did  good  in  one  case  did  harm  in' 
another.  ISTor  was  a  good  constitution  any  proof  of 
strength  to  resist  it,  or  of  weakness ;  but  it  seized  all 
alike,  even  such  as  were  under  dietetic  treatment 
previously.  And  the  most  terrible  feature  of  all  in 
this  disease  was  the  despondency  when  any  one  felt 
himself  sickening  (for  they  betook  themselves  to 
despair  at  once,  and  gave  up  morally  even  more  than 
physically,  and  so  offered  no  resistance),  and  the  way 
in  which  they  imbibed  infection  from  attending  each 
other,  and  died  like  sheep.  And  this  it  was  that 
caused  the  greatest  mortality.  For  if  out  of  fear  they 
were  unwilling  to  come  near  one  another,  then  the 
sufferers  died  from  being  left  untended;  and  many 
households  were  swept  entirely  away,  from  lack  of  any 
to  nurse  them.  Or,  if  any  did  go  near  the  sick,  they 

*  Livy  (Ixi.  21 )  make.s  the  same  remark  as  to  these  natural 
scavengers,  in  his  notice  of  the  pestilence  in  Italy,  b.c.  174. 
In  England,  in  1348,  the  “  Black  Death”  was  accompanied  by 
a  murrain  among  the  cattle,  and  it  was  remarked  that  the  birds 
of  prey  would  not  touch  the  carcases.  (The  cattle  of  the 
Athenians,  it  may  be  remembered,  had  mostly  been  carried 
over  to  the  islands,  and  therefore  probably  escaped. ) 


58 


Til  UCYDI ]>  ES. 


lost  tlieir  lives,  and  especially  those  who  had  a  charac¬ 
ter  for  goodness;  for  they,  for  honour’s  sake,  would 
not  spare  themselves,  but  went  in  and  out  among  their 
friends,  whereas  even  the  very  members  of  the  family 
grew  tired  of  mourning  over  the  dying,  so  utterly 
beaten  were  they  by  the  overwhelming  misery.  How¬ 
ever,  those  who  had  recovered  showed  more  compas¬ 
sion  for  the  sick  and  dying,  because  they  knew  what 
it  was,  and  stood  in  no  fear  now  for  themselves  ;  for 
it  never  attacked  the  same  person  twice,  at  least  so 
as  to  be  fatal.  And  such  persons  were  thought  very 
fortunate  by  their  neighbours,  and  felt  a  kind  of 
hope  themselves,  in  the  joy  of  their  present  escape, 
of  immunity  for  the  future,  and  that  they  should 
never  now  fall  victuns  to  any  other  disease.” — (II. 
49-51.) 

There  was  a  great  physician  living  at  this  time, 
quite  within  reach  of  Athens,  who  must  have  heard  of 
this  terrible  epidemic,  and  it  seems  hardly  possible  but 
that  some  cases  must  have  come  under  his  hands. 
Hippocrates  of  Cos  was  probably  then  resident  either 
in  the  island  of  Thasos,  or  at  Abdera  in  Thrace ;  but 
though  he  has  left  us  a  body  of  cases,  and  though  he 
speaks  of  a  “malignant  year,”  which  may  or  may  not 
(for  he  gives  no  date)  be  the  year  in  which  this  pesti¬ 
lence  was  prevalent,  he  has  not  put  on  record  any  case 
which  can  be  safely  referred  to  this  terrible  epidemic. 
It  has  been  thought  possible  that  Thucydides,  in  his 
exile,  may  have  seen  and  conversed  with  the  great 
physician,  and  submitted  to  his  correction  his  notes  on 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


59 


the  disease,  which  would  account  for  their  almost 
technical  minuteness. 

The  fatal  character  of  the  pestilence  was  aggravated, 
as  the  historian  observes,  by  the  crowded  state  of  the 
city,  which  rendered  impossible  the  observance  of  even 
such  imperfect  sanitary  regulations  as  we  may  conceive 
then  existing  in  Athens.  His  picture  of  the  sight 
which  the  plague-stricken  city  presented  is  given  in 
few  but  emphatic  words  : — 

“  Living  as  they  did  in  close  stifling  cabins  in  the 
hot  time  of  the  year,  the  mortality  raged  among  them 
in  horrible  fashion.  The  bodies  lay  dying  one  upon 
another,  rolling  in  agony  in  the  public  streets  and 
round  all  the  fountains,  in  their  eagerness  after  water. 
Even  the  sacred  precincts,  in  which  some  had  pitched 
tents,  were  full  of  the  dead  bodies  of  those  who  had 
expired  there ;  for  in  their  overwhelming  misery,  not 
knowing  what  would  become  of  them,  men  grew  care 
less  of  all  distinctions  sacred  or  profane  ” — (II.  52.) 

He  goes  on  to  speak  of  the  disregard  of  all  the 
decent  rites  of  burial,  to  which  a  Greek  mind  attached 
perhaps  even  more  value  than  we  do  ourselves.  He 
tells  us  how  corpses  were  thrown  by  the  bearers  upon 
funeral  piles  which  had  already  been  lighted  for 
another  family ;  and  how  even  sometimes  a  pile  was 
suiTeptitiously  set  fire  to  and  made  to  do  its  office  for 
a  stranger,  before  its  proper  corpse  could  be  carried 
out  for  burial.  But  more  striking  than  all  is  the 
description  which  he  gives  of  the  utter  depravation  of 


60 


THUCYDIDES. 


morals,  and  “recklessness  of  living,”  which  followed 
upon  these  daily  spectacles  of  sudden  and  horrible 
death.  It  was  the  complete  carrying  out  into  practice 
of  the  heathen  motto,  “  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to¬ 
morrow  we  die.” 

“  Deeds  which  men  did  before  in  secret,  not  daring 
to  give  full  rein  to  their  lusts,  they  now  did  with  all 
freedom,  as  seeing  the  sudden  change  which  came  in  a 
moment  between  the  rich  who  died  suddenly,  and  the 
poor  who  came  into  their  wealth  instead.  So  they 
determined  upon  swift  enjoyment  and  instant  grati¬ 
fication,  holding  life  aiid  riches  alike  things  of  a  day. 
As  for  wearying  themselves  in  the  pursuit  of  what  was 
honourable,  it  was  what  no  man  cared  to  do,  for  he 
held  it  uncertain  whether  he  might  not  he  carried  off 
before  he  attained  it ;  but  whatever  was  pleasant  for 
the  moment,  and  whatever  led  to  that  by  any  means, 
this  stood  for  honourable  and  expedient.  Fear  of  the 
gods,  or  respect  for  man,  there  was  none  to  restrain 
them :  in  the  one  case,  because  they  judged  it  to  be 
all  the  same  whether  they  gave  them  worship  or  not, 
from  seeing  that  all  perished  alike ;  and  in  the  case  of 
crimes  against  man,  none  expected  that  they  should 
live  to  be  brought  to  trial  and  suffer  the  penalty  for 
them;  but  thata'far  heavier  sentence  had  already  been 
passed  upon  them,  and  was  hanging  over  their  heads, 
and  that  it  was  but  fair  they  should  have  some  enjoy¬ 
ment  of  life  before  it  fell.” — (II.  53.) 

A  similar  result,  with  regard  to  public  morality,  is 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


61 


said  to  have  accompanied  the  great  plague  at  Florence 
in  1348.  Boccaccio  says,  in  his  account  of  it,  that 
“  when  the  evil  had  become  universal,  the  hearts  of  all 
the  inhabitants  were  closed  to  feelings  of  humanity ;  ” 
and  that,  “  amid  the  general  lamentation  and  woe,  the 
influence  and  authority  of  every  law  human  and 
divine  vanished.”  *  The  same  was  the  case  to  some 
extent  durmg  the  prevalence  of  the  “  Black  Death  ”  in 
England,  in  the  same  year. 

The  oracle  of  Apollo,  it  may  be  remembered,  had 
promised  the  Peloponnesians,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
war,  that  the  god  himself  would  help  them,  “  invited 
or  uninvited.”  It  was  to  the  influence  of  the  Sun-god 
that  the  Greeks,  not  altogether  without  reason,  at¬ 
tributed  visitations  of  pestilence.  He  was  the  sender  of 
such  diseases,  as  he  was  also  emphatically  the  “Healer.” 
The  Peloponnesians  might  well  have  recognised  his 
aid  when  they  heard  of  the  terrible  sufferings  of  their 
enemies ;  and  it  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  their 
own  army,  considering  its  immediate  proximity,  seems 
wholly  to  have  escaped.  The  Athenians  on  their  part 
bethought  themselves  of  a  half-forgotten  oracular  verse 
which  warned  them  of  a  Dorian  war  to  come,  “and 
with  it  a  pestilence.”  There  was  considerable  doubt 
as  to  this  latter  word ;  for  while  some  insisted  that 
it  was  pestilence  (loimos),  others  said  it  was  famine 
(limos)  which  had  been  predicted.  The  ambiguity 
was  natural  enough,  for  the  pronunciation  of  the  two 
words  in  the  Greek  was  exactly  the  same^ — lemos.  The 
comment  of  the  historian  himself  is  curiously  modern  in 
*  Hecker,  Epidera.  of  Middle  Ages,  p.  47.  ' 


62 


THUCYDIDES. 


its  scepticism.  I^’aturally,  he  says,  that  reading  of  the- 
oracle  was  universally  adopted  which  fitted  in  best 
with  present  circumstances ;  people’s  memory  is  apt  to 
adapt  itself  to  notorious  facts.  “  I  suppose,  however,” 
he  goes  on  to  say,  “if  another  Dorian  war  were  to 
come  after  this,  and  a  famine  happened  to  accompany 
it,  in  all  probability  the  verse  would  be  made  to  run 
accordingly.” 

It  had  been  part  of  the  deliberate  policy  of  Pericles 
to  allow  the  invaders  to  work  their  will  upon  the  fields 
of  Attica ;  but  he  was  taking  energetic  measures  to 
carry  on  the  Avar  against  them  where  Athens  had  ahvays 
the  advantage — by  sea.  While  the  enemy’s  troops  were 
still  quartered  in  Athenian  territory,  he  Avas  sweeping 
the  southern  coast  of  the  Peloponnese  with  a  fleet  of 
a  hundred  and  fifty  sail ;  landing  here  and  there,  and 
employing  his  heavy  infantry,  and  even  a  body  of 
cavalry  (which  Ave  read  of  now  for  the  first  time  as 
being  conveyed  over  sea  in  horse-transports),  against  the 
maritime  toAvns,  Avith  considerable  success.  Another 
effort  Avas  made  also  against  Potidaea,  Avhich  Avas  stiU 
holding  out.  But  the  plague  accompanied  the  rein¬ 
forcements  Avhich  were  sent  to  Thrace,  and  Hagnon, 
AA’^ho  comnianded  them,  after  losing  in  one  month 
one-fourth  of  his  4000  men,  had  to  put  to  sea  again  to 
save  the  remainder. 

In  this  season  of  distress,  the  commons  of  Athens 
turned  upon  the  man  whom  they  regarded  as  the  author 
of  it  all — Pericles,  who  had  advocated  tlie  Avar,  and 
promised  them  certain  victory.  They  accused  him, 
openly  and  secretly,  of  being  the  ruin  of  his  country, 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


63 


and  clamoured  loudly  for  peace  at  any  price  with 
Sparta.  The  great  statesman  was  neither  surprised  nor 
alarmed  at  the  turn  of  popular  opinion.  It  was  the 
very  thing  he  had  expected,  says  the  historian.  By 
virtue  of  his  office  of  general,  which  he  still  held,  he 
summoned  a  public  Assembly.  He  told  them  plainly 
that  nothing  of  the  kind  surprised  him  :  it  was  the  way 
of  the  world ;  but  surely,  unworthy  of  Athenians.  Bor 
himself,  he  scorned  to  qualify  his  original  advice,  or 
admit  that  he  had  been  mistaken 

“I  am  the  same  that  1  was  then,  and  I  am  not 
going  to  retreat  from  my  position :  it  is  you  who  are 
changed ;  for  the  fact  is,  you  were  ready  to  follow  my 
advice  when  danger  had  not  touched  you,  and  you 
repent  now  that  you  have  begim  to  suffer ;  and  my 
counsel  seems  to  you  to  be  wrong,  owing  to  your  own 
weakness  of  resolution  :  because  the  suffering  comes 
home  to  each  man’s  feelinf^s  at  once,  while  the  advan- 
tages  do  not  as  yet  make  themselves  clear  to  any. 
Because  a  great  reverse,  and  that  on  the  sudden,  has 
befallen  you,  you  are  too  utterly  dispirited  to  persevere 
in  the  course  you  chose.  Yes — the  sudden  and  the 
unexpected,  and  what  befaUs  us  contrary  to  all  reason¬ 
able  calculation,  has  a  tendency  to  enslave  the  spirit ; 
and  this  is  your  case,  especially  as  regards  this  pestilence, 
coming  as  it  has  in  addition  to  our  other  misfortunes. 
Still,  citizens  as  you  are  of  a  great  city,  and  brought  up 
in  principles  corresponding  to  this  greatness,  it  were 
your  duty  to  stand  up  cheerfully  against  great  reverses 
too,  and  never  tarnish  your  high  name.  For  the  world 


64 


THUCYDIDES. 


claims  the  same  right  to  censure  those  who  from  lack 
of  spirit  fail  to  maintain  the  reputation  they  have  won, 
as  to  hate  those  who  impudently  grasp  at  that  to 
which  they  have  no  claim.  Your  duty  is  to  check 
your  grief  for  your  private  sufferings,  and  hold  fast  to 
the  maintenance  of  the  public  weal.” 

There  are  passages  in  this  speech  which  would  seem 
to  show  that  even  Pericles  had  sometimes  before  him 
that  vision  of  a  widespread  empire  which  had  already 
begun  to  dazzle  some  of  the  leading  minds  at  Athens. 

“You  look  upon  your  empire  as  extending  only  over 
your  subject-allies :  I  can  show  you  that  of  the  two 
realms  open  to  men’s  use — land  and  sea — you  are 
already  wholly  masters  of  the  one  as  far  as  you  reach 
now,  and  as  much  further  as  you  may  choose  to  reach. 
With  the  force  you  have,  there  is  no  king  nor  any 
nation  existing  at  this  present  who  can  hinder  you  from 
sailing  whither  you  will.  So  that  this  power  is  not  to 
be  put  in  comparison  with  your  property  in  lands  and 
houses,  which  you  think  it  so  much  to  lose.  It  is  not 
reasonable  that  you  should  take  the  loss  of  these  things 
so  hardly  :  you  should  regard  them  rather  with  in- 
dilFerence,  as  the  mere  appanages  and  embellishments 
of  a  wealthy  estate,  when  weighed  against  that  power 
I  speak  of.  Be  sure  that  if  we  only  cling  to  and 
maintain  our  freedom,  that  will  easily  recover  for  us 
all  the  rest ;  whilst  if  once  we  bow  to  the  power  of 
others,  all  we  possess  will  be  likely  to  crumble  away. 
Show  that  you  have  not  degenerated  in  two  great 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


65 


points  from  your  fathers :  through  toil  and  danger 
they  acquired  this  dominion  —  they  did  not  receive 
it  as  an  inheritance  from  others  moreover,  they  main¬ 
tained  it  and  handed  it  down  to  you :  and  it  were 
baser  to  let  what  we  have  be  taken  from  us,  than  to 
have  been  unsuccessful  m’  its  acquisition. 

•  •••••  t 

“Do  not  suppose  that  you  are  fighting  on  this 
single  question — whether  it  shall  be  vassalage  or  in¬ 
dependence  ;  it  is  also  whether  you  will  be  stripped  of 
your  empire,  and  so  incur  all  the  danger  arising  from  the 
hatred  your  rule  has  provoked.  And  you  cannot  give 
it  up  now — if  any  man  under  present  circumstances, 
because  he  is  afraid,  should  propose  to.  play  the  mag¬ 
nanimous  by  so  doing,  and  would  have  us  as  a  nation 
retire  into  private  life.  This  power  you  hold  has 
already  become  a  despotism,  which,  however  it  may 
have  been  unrighteous  to  usurp,  it  is  very  dangerous  to 
lay  down.  Such  counsellors  would  very  soon  ruin  a 
state  if  they  could  persuade  their  fellow-citizens,  or  if 
they  were  to  occupy  an  independent  colony  anywhere 
by  themselves ;  for  the  peacemonger  is  only  safe  so 
long  as  he  has  a  fighting  friend  to  stand  by  him  ;  and 
it  cannot  be  good  policy  for  a  sovereign  state,  whatever 
it  may  be  for  a  subject  one,  to  seek  its  safety  in  loss  of 
independence.” — (II.  61-63.) 

The  effect  of  this  speech  upon  the  Athenians  was  that, 
so  far  as  any  change  in  their  public  policy  went,  they 
followed  the  advice  of  Pericles,  and  gave  up  the  project 
of  making  terms  with  Sparta.  But  so  bitterly  did  they 

A.C.S.S.  vol.  vi.  B 


66 


THUCYDIDES, 


feel  the  pressure  of  the  war  upon  them  as  individuals, 
so  personally  angry  were  they  with  him  as  its  author, 
that  they  called  upon  him  to  furnish  a  statement  of  his 
expenditure  of  the  public  treasure,  and  on  some  pretence 
of  malversation,  fined  him  a  sum  of  money — “  and  not 
long  after,”  says  our  historian,  “chose  him  general 
again,  and  put  everything  into  his  hands.”  They  had 
made  trial,  it  would  seem,  of  some  weaker  instruments 
meanwhile,  and  found  them  wanting. 

And  here — restored  to  his  old  supremacy — the 
great  Athenian  disappears  from  the  pages  of  our  his¬ 
torian.  He  lived  about  a  year  longer ;  just  long 
enough  to  see  the  termination  of  the  long  blockade 
of  Potidaea,  which  capitulated  to  the  Athenians  on  terms 
that  the  sovereign  people  thought  far  too  easy, — the 
garrison  and  inhabitants  being  allowed  to  evacuate 
the  place  with  something  like  the  honours  of  war. 
But  the  death  of  Pericles  is  only  briefly  mentioned 
by  the  way.  Thucydides  is  emphatically  the  his¬ 
torian  of  the  war,  and  he  seldom  turns  aside  to 
dwell  upon  the  personal  history  or  characters  of  even 
the  most  illustrious  of  those  who  took  part  in  it.  In 
the  case  of  Pericles,  however,  his  earnest  admiration 
of  the  man  finds  expression  even  in  the  brief  record 
which,  with  exceptional  favour,  he  pauses  here  for  a 
moment  to  give  of  his  services  to  the  state 

“  So  long  as  he  stood  at  the  head  of  state  in  time 
of  peace,  he  governed  with  moderation  and  maintained 
it  in  safety,  and  under  him  it  rose  to  its  highest  power. 
And  when  the  war  broke  out,  ho  proved  that  he  had 


THE  PLAGUE  AT  ATHENS. 


G7 


well  calculated  the  state’s  resources.  He  lived  through 
two  years  and  a  half  of  it;  and  when  he  died,  his 
foresight  as  to  its  conduct  became  even  more  generally 
admitted.  For  he  always  said  that  if  they  kept  quiet, 
and  paid  due  attention  to  their  navy,  and  did  not 
grasp  at  extension  of  empire  during  the  war,  or 
expose  their  city  to  danger,  they  would  he  the  victors. 
But  they  did  the  very  contrary  to  all  this;  and  in 
matters  which  seemed  to  have  no  reference  to  the  war, 
they  followed  an  evil  policy  as  to  their  own  interests 
and  those  of  their  allies,  in  accordance  with  their 
private  jealousies  and  private  advantage ;  measures 
which,  when  successful,  brought  honour  and  profit 
to  individuals  only,  while  if  they  failed,  the  disadvan¬ 
tage  was  felt  by  the  state  in  its  results  on  the  war. 
The  reason  lay  in  this ;  that  Pericles,  powerful  by  his 
influence  and  ability,  and  manifestly  incorruptible  by 
bribes,  exercised  a  control  over  the  masses  combined 
with  excellent  tact,  and  rather  led  them  than  allowed 
them  to  lead  him.  For  since  he  did  not  gain  his 
ascendancy  by  unbecoming  means,  he  never  used  lan¬ 
guage  to  humour  them,  but  was  able,  on  the  strength 
of  his  high  character,  even  to  oppose  their  passions. 
That  is,  when  he  saw  them  overweeningly  confident 
without  just  grounds,  he  would  speak  so  as  to  inspire 
them  with  a  wholesome  fear ;  or  wh«n  they  were  un¬ 
reasonably  alarmed,  he  would  raise  their  spirits  again 
to  confidence.  It  was  a  nominal  democracy,  but  in  fact 
the  government  of  the  one  foremost  man.” — (II.  65.) 

All  the  authorities  Avhich  we  have  for  the  history 


68 


THUCYDIDES. 


of  the  times  fully  bear  out  this  estimate  of  the  posi¬ 
tion  of  Pericles  in  the  Athenian  state.  Por  the  private 
sorrows  which  marked  the  close  of  his  life,  and  which 
may  have  helped  to  shorten  it,  we  have  to  turn  to 
the — not  always  veracious — pages  of  Plutarch.  He 
had  lost  by  the  prevailing  epidemic  two  sons,  a  sister, 
and  many  of  his  dearest  political  friends.  He  died 
of  some  lingering  malady;  Plutarch  says  it  was  one 
form  of  the  same  disease.  True  patriot  to  the  end, 
when  the  friends  who  stood  round  his  deathbed  were 
speaking  of  his  glorious  career,  he  checked  them  by 
remarking  that  none  had  yet  named  what  he  held  to 
he  his  chief  glory — “that  no  fellow-citizen  had  ever 
had  cause  to  put  on  mourning  through  him.” 

The  plague  continued  its  ravages  in  Athens  for  two 
whole  years,  and  then,  after  an  interval  of  twelve 
months,  broke  out  again  b.c.  427,  and  lasted  another 
year.  It  carried  off  altogether  4400  of  the  heavy 
infantry,  300  cavalry  (all  of  whom  would  be  citizens 
of  some  position),  and  of  the  lower  classes  “  a  number 
never  ascertained :  ”  of  women  and  children  the  his¬ 
torian  seems  to  take  no  account.  The  total  loss  of  life 
probably  exceeded  the  number  of  those  slain  in  battle 
during  the  whole  war. 


CHAPTEE  VT. 


THE  SIEGE  OP  PLATiEA. 

The  confederate  Peloponnesians  now  sought  aic  Irom 
a  quarter  any  appeal  to  which,  we  might  have  the  aght, 
would  have  been  held  treason  to  Greece,  did  we  not 
know  that  Athens  had  done  the  same  early  in  the  war. 
They  sent  an  embassy  to  the  king  of  Persia,  to  ask 
for  a  subsidy  and  for  troops.  Their  envoys  took  Thrace 
in  their  way,  endeavouring  to  detach  Sitalces,  king  of 
a  large  part  of  Thrace,  from  the  interests  of  Athens, 
and  to  induce  him  to  make  an  attack  on  their  colony 
of  Potidsea.  The  negotiation  was  more  than  unsuccess¬ 
ful  ;  for  the  son  of  Sitalces,  who  had  received  the 
freedom  of  Athens,  put  the  visitors  into  the  hands 
of  the  Athenians.  They  were  carried  at  once  to  Athens, 
and  there  put  to  death  without  a  hearing — in  retaliation^ 
the  Athenians  said,  for  similar  cruel  treatment  of  their 
own  merchant-sailors  and  others  who  had  been  captured 
by  the  enemy  on  their  coasts.  But  the  barbarities 
which  marked  this  war  in  general  were  so  great  on  both 
sides,  that  Thucydides  might  have  spared  here,  as  he 
commonly  does,  any  apology  or  explanation. 

In  the  chronicle  of  this  year  we  get  one  of  the  few 


70 


THUCYDIDES. 


notices  which  occur  in  oitr  author’s  pages  of  Athenian 
commerce;  and  here  only  because  it  falls  into  the 
history  of  the  war.  They  sent  a  squadron  of  six  ships 
to  watch  the  coast  of  Lycia  and  Caria,  both  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  subsidies  of  money  from  the  sea-coast 
towns,  and  also  to  hinder  the  enemy’s  privateers 
(Thucydides  roundly  calls  them  “  pirates,”  but  we  must 
remember  that  even  up  to  this  date  piracy  had  scarcely 
lost  its  credit  as  a  profession  for  “gentlemen  adventur¬ 
ers  ”)  “  from  making  those  harbours  their  rendezvous 
for  attacking  the  merchant  -  vessels  on  their  voyage 
from  Phaselis  and  Phoenicia.” 

The  first  movement  in  the  third  campaign  was  made 
by  the  Peloponnesians,  not  by  a  raid  as  before  into 
the  Athenian  borders,  but  by  an  expedition  in  full  force, 
under  the  Spartan  king  Archidamus,  against  the  inde¬ 
pendent  town  of  Platsea,  which  enjoyed  the  intimate 
alliance  and  protection  of  Athens.  The  Thebans  had 
not  forgotten  their  ill-fated  attempt  upon  the  city  two 
years  before,  and  the  massacre  of  the  prisoners ;  and  they 
were  no  doubt  clamorous  among  the  allies  for  revenge. 
When  the  invaders  had  pitched  their  camp  and  sent 
out  their  plundering  parties,  the  Platteans  earnestly 
remonstrated.  They  reminded  the  Spartan  king  that 
the  independence  of  their  little  state  had  been  guar¬ 
anteed  to  them  for  ever  by  his  own  countryman  Pau- 
sanias,  in  gratitude  for  that  memorable  victory  gained 
within  sight  of  their  walls,  when  he  with  their  help 
had  liberated  Greece  from  the  Medes;  and  they  adjured 
him  not  to  violate  so  solemn  an  engagement.  There  is 
some  sophistry  in  the  Spartan’s  answer : — 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PLATjEA. 


“Ye  speak  fair  enough,  men  of  Plataea,  if  ye  do  but  act 
as  ye  speak.  Enjoy  your  independence  yourselves,  even 
as  Pausanias  gave  it,  and  assist  us  in  giving  indepen¬ 
dence  to  your  neighbours, — to  all  who  shared  the  danger 
then  and  swore  the  same  oaths,  and  are  now  under  the 
power  of  the  Athenians.  It  is  to  free  them  and  others 
from  this  yoke,  that  this  warlike  array  has  been  set  on 
foot.  So  take  your  part  in  it, — so  will  you  best  abide 
by  your  sworn  faith.  Or  if  you  cannot  do  this,  then 
remain  quiet,  as  we  at  first  invited  you,  occupy  your 
own  borders,  and  take  part  with  neither  side,  admitting 
both  as  friends,  but  for  military  operations  neither. 
And  this  will  content  us.” — (II.  72.) 

The  Platseans  held  a  public  council  before  they  gave 
their  answer.  They  could  do  nothing,  they  said,  with¬ 
out  consulting  Athens,  for  there  they  had  bestowed 
their  wives  and  children ;  nor,  even  should  they  adopt 
the  neutral  policy  proposed,  could  they  depend  on  the 
Thebans  respecting  it.  Archidamus  made  them  another 
proposal :  let  them  migrate  from  Platsea,  and  give  up 
their  lands  and  their  projDerty  into  the  hands  of  the 
Lacedaemonians,  who  would  maintain  them  so  long  as 
the  war  should  last  wherever  they  chose  to  fix  them¬ 
selves,  and  restore  all  to  them  when  it  was  over.  The 
Platseans  asked  leave  to  refer  this  proposition  to  Athens; 
and  there  they  received  assurances  of  support,  so  long 
as  they  maintained  their  fealty.  Then,  speaking  from 
their  walls,  as  not  trusting  themselves  in  any  further 
negotiation,  they  made  answer  to  the  Spartans  that  to 
accept  their  terms  was  “  impossible.” 


72 


THUCYDIDES. 


Thereupon,  after  an  appeal  to  the  gods  to  defend  the 
right,  Archidamus  began  the  memorable  siege  of  Platsea : 
the  earliest  of  which  we  possess  any  details  that  can 
he  called  historical.  It  is  described  by  the  writer  with 
the  minutest  particulars,  which  he  must  have  heard  from 
some  one  who  took  part  in  it.  How  the  enemy  sur¬ 
rounded  the  city  with  a  wooden  palisade  made  out  of 
the  fruit-trees  which  had  already  been  cut  down :  how 
they  brought  larger  timber  from  the  forests  of  the 
neighbouring  Mount  Cithaeron,  and  built  an  inclined 
plane,  into  which  earth  was  rammed,  against  a  part  of 
the  town-wall,  in  order  to  enter  the  place  by  storm, 
working  at  it  in  relays  for  seventy  days  and  seventy 
nights  :  how  the  besieged  on  their  part  raised  their 
wall  higher  from  the  inside  at  the  point  where  the 
danger  threatened,  pulling  down  houses  to  obtain 
material,  and  prdtecting  the  face  of  the  work  with  raw 
hides  against  the  fire-arrows  armed  with  lighted  tow: 
how  they  undermined  the  mound  that  was  rising  against 
them,  by  boring  into  it  through  the  bottom  of  their  own 
wall  and  carrying  away  the  earth  inside :  and  how, 
when  this  device  was  discovered,  and  the  mound  still 
rose  higher  and  higher,  they  began  a  new  wall,  in  an 
inverted  segment  of  a  circle,  within  the  old  one,  so 
that  the  enemy  would  gain  nothing  even  when  this 
latter  was  won.  The  Peloponnesians  made  a  final 
effort,  which  had  nearly  succeeded,  by  throwing  lighted 
fagots  and  other  combustibles  over  into  the  to^vn:  but 
a  heavy  thunderstorm  came  at  the  critical  moment  (at 
least,  “  it  is  so  reported  ”)  to  the  aid  of  the  beseiged. 

Part  of  the  army  then  left,  and  the  siege  became  an 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PLAT ^ A, 


73 


investment.  The  wooden  palisade  was  replaced  by  a 
double  wall  with  a  covered  -  way  between,  and  con¬ 
necting  watch-towers  at  intervals,  and  a  ditch  on  either 
side  :  it  was  well  understood  that  the  blockade  was 
likely  to  be  a  long  one.  Inside  the  place  were  four 
hmidred  Platjnans  and  eighty  Athenians— -all  fighting 
men  :  the  non-combatants  had  been  sent  away  long 
before,  excepting  a  hundred  and  ten  women  to  make 
bread.  Our  author  leaves  them  in  this  position  for 
eighteen  months,  in  order  to  preserve  his  yearly  tabu¬ 
lation  of  events ;  but  this  interrupts  too  much  the 
reader’s  interest  in  his  story. 

The  close  investment  did  its  work  effectually ;  and 
the  troops  within  the  walls,  few  as  they  were,  began  to 
suffer  from  the  want  of  provisions,  and  saw  little  hope 
of  aid  from  without.  They  determined  on  an  attempt 
to  escape.  The  double  wall  of  circumvallation  which 
their  enemies  had  drawn  round  them,  in  order  to  be 
effectual  for  its  purpose,  had  to  be  strictly  guarded 
and  patrolled  \  and  the  Plataeans  had  found  out 
that  in  the  wet  and  cold  nights  the  patrols  were 
in  the  habit  of  retiring  under  cover  of  the  towers. 
Their  plans  were  formed  accordingly :  scaling-ladders 
were  prepared,  and  they  watched  an  opportunity  to 
make  an  attempt  to  pass  over  the  double  fortification 
under  cover  of  a  stormy  night.  Half  of  them  lost 
their  taste  afterwards  for  so  desperate  an  attempt ;  two 
hundred  and  twenty  persevered  in  their  resolution,  and 
succeeded.  It  is  one  of  the  historian’s  most  graphic 
narratives,  well-known  in  substance,  but  scarcely  better 
told  than  in  his  own  words : — 


74 


THUCYDIDES. 


“When  all  was  ready,  they  waited  for  a  stormy 
night  with  wind  and  rain,  and  when  there  was  no 
moon,  and  so  set  out,  the  contrivers  of  the  attempt 
leading  the  way.  And  first  they  crossed  the  ditch 
which  girdled  them  on  their  own  side,  and  got  to  the 
enemy’s  wall,  without  attracting  the  notice  of  the 
watch,  since  these  could  not  see  far  through  the  dark¬ 
ness,  and  did  not  hear  the  sound  of  their  approach 
because  the  noise  of  the  wind  drowned  it.  They 
moved,  too,  at  careful  distance  from  each  other,  that 
their  arms  might  not  clash  together  and  so  make  their 
movements  heard.  They  were  in  very  light  marching 
order,  with  the  left  foot  only  shod,  so  as  to  give  them 
safe  footing  m  the  mud.  So  they  made  for  the  battle¬ 
ments  in  the  mid-space  between  two  of  the  towers,  satis¬ 
fied  that  they  should  find  these  deserted.  First  came 
those  who  bore  the  ladders,  and  planted  them ;  then 
twelve  of  the  light  company  mounted,  armed  with 
dagger  and  breastplate  only,  led  by  Ammias  son  of  Co 
raebus,  who  was  the  first  to  mount ;  after  him  the  rest 
followed  and  reached  the  top,  making  for  each  of  the 
towers.  Other  light -armed  soldiers  followed,  with 
nothing  but  short  spears, — their  shields,  in  order  that 
they  might  mount  the  quicker,  being  carried  by  others 
behind  them,  who  were  to  pass  them  to  their  owners 
when  they  engaged  the  enemy.  When  a  good  many 
had  got  up,  the  guard  from  within  the  towers  heard 
them ;  for  one  of  the  Plataeans,  in  laying  hold  of  the 
battlement,  displaced  a  tde  from  it,  which  rattled  as  it 
fell.  At  once  the  alarm  was  shouted,  and  the  enemy 
rushed  from  their  lines  to  the  walls ;  for  they  did  not 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PLATjEA. 


75 


know  what  the  alarm  meant,  in  the  dark  night  and  in 
the  storm.  At  the  same  moment  the  Platseans  who 
had  been  left  in  the  town  sallied  out,  and  attacked  the 
enemy’s  line  of  circumvallation  on  the  side  opposite  to 
that  where  their  comrades  were  climbing  over,  to  divert 
attention  as  much  as  possible  from  them.  The  enemy 
were  bewildered,  therefore,  and  remained  at  their  seve¬ 
ral  quarters  ;  and  no  man  ventured  to  leave  his  own 
station  to  support  the  others,  but  all  were  at  a  loss 
to  make  out  what  was  going  on.  Even  the  three 
hundred  who  had  been  told  off  to  give  support  at  any 
point  where  it  was  required,  went  outside  their  works 
to  the  quarter  whence  the  shouts  proceeded.  Fire- 
signals  of  alarm  were  made  to  Thebes;  but  the 
Platseans  lighted  several  beacons  on  their  walls  which 
had  been  prepared  for  the  purpose,  so  that  the  signals 
might  be  unintelligible  to  the  enemy,  and  they  might 
not  march  to  the  aid  of  their  friends,  but  might  fancy 
the  state  of  affairs  to  be  anything  but  what  it  really 
was,  until  the  fugitives  shall  have  got  clear  away  and 
reached  a  place  of  safety. 

“  Meanwhile,  as  to  the  Plataeans  who  were  scaling 
the  wall,  as  soon  as  the  foremost  of  them  had  got  up 
and  made  themselves  masters  of  both  the  towers,  and 
slain  the  guard,  they  posted  themselves  at  the  thorough¬ 
fare  at  each  of  the  towers,  so  as  to  let  no  one  pass 
through  to  the  rescue.  They  then  planted  ladders 
from  the  wall  against  the  towers,  and  so  sent  up  a 
good  many  of  their  men.  Those  on  the  towers  and 
under  them  kept  off  any  that  were  coming  to  the 
rescue;  while  the  main  body,  having  planted  addi- 


76 


THUCYDIDES. 


bional  ladders,  and  also  pulled  down  some  of  the 
battlements,  were  climbing  over  the  works  in  the 
space  between  the  towers.  Each  man,  as  he  got  OA^er, 
took  his  place  on  the  edge  of  the  ditch,  and  from  that 
position  they  kept  off  with  arrows  and  javelins  any 
who  might  come  along  the  side  of  the  wall  to  hinder 
the  crossing.  When  all  had  crossed  over,  then  the 
men  from  the  towers  —  the  hindmost  not  without 
difficulty — descended  and  got  on  the  ditch.  Mean¬ 
while  the  guard  of  three  hundred  were  coming  up  with 
torches,  x^^ow  the  Platseans,  standing  in  the  shadow 
on  the  edge  of  the  ditch,  got  a  good  sight  of  them,  and 
launched  their  arrows  and  javelins  against  them  as 
they  stood  exposed;  while,  keeping  in  the  dark  as 
they  did  themselves,  they  were  all  the  less  visible  for 
the  torch -light,  so  that  even  the  last  of  their  party 
succeeded  in  passing  the  ditch ;  not,  however,  without 
much  toil  and  difficulty,  for  there  was  ice  formed  on 
it,  not  strong  enough  to  bear,  but  somewhat  slushy,  as 
is  commonly  the  case  with  an  easterly  wind ;  and  as 
there  was  snow  falling  that  night  with  this  wind,  it 
produced  a  great  deal  of  water  in  the  ditch,  which 
they  had  to  cross  up  to  their  necks.  Still,  it  was  in 
great  measure  owing  to  the  violence  of  the  storm  that 
they  succeeded  in  escaping.” — (III.  23.) 

The  attempt  was  carried  out  with  the  same  com 
bination  of  daring  and  forethought  to  the  end.  The 
fugitives  made  straight  for  Thebes,  “  thinking  that  the 
Peloponnesians  would  never  dream  of  their  taking  that 
road  into  an  enemy’s  country ;  ”  and  it  must  have  been 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PLAT  Hi  A. 


77 


with  a  grim  satisfaction  that  they  “  saw  theh  pursuers 
moving  with  torches  along  the  road  to  Athens,”  which 
they  naturall}’’  were  supposed  to  have  taken,  and  which 
place  they  did  reach  eventually  by  striking  off  into  the 
mountains.  Two  hundred  and  twelve  got  clear  away, 
out  of  two  hundred  and  twenty  who  had  left  the  town. 
Some  few  had  lost  heart  at  the  outset,  and  turned  hack  ; 
one  had  been  taken  prisoner;  hut  not  a  single  life 
appears  to  have  been  lost  in  the  gallant  adventure. 
Those  whose  courage  had  failed  them  told  their 
comrades  in  the  town  that  all  the  rest  of  the  party 
had  been  slain ;  and  it  was  not  until  the  garrison  sent 
into  the  enemy’s  lines  next  morning  for  the  usual 
permission  to  “bury  their  dead,”  that  they  learned 
they  had  no  dead  to  bury. 

The  investment  was  continued,  and  still  the  de¬ 
fenders  held  out;  hut  though  the  gallant  exploit 
which  has  been  related  had  left  fewer  mouths  to  he 
fed,  the  stock  of  provisions  within  the  walls  was  at  last 
exhausted.  The  escape  of  the  two  himdred  had  also 
weakened  the  little  garrison  ;  and  the  commander  of 
the  Lacedaemonian  forces  was  well  aware  that  he  could 
take  the  place  any  day  by  storm.  He  would  not  do  so, 
for  a  curious  strategic  reason.  It  was  usual,  in  Greek 
negotiations  at  the  close  of  a  war,  to  agree  to  restore 
aU  conquests  on  both  sides,  but  not  such  places  as  had 
come  over  by  voluntary  capitulation :  and  the  Lace¬ 
daemonians  hoped  by  this  means  to  retain  the  town  of 
Plattea  as  a  permanent  acquisition. 

Driven  thus  to  extremities,  at  the  end  of  two  years 
of  close  blockade,  the  few  remaining  defenders  at  last 


78 


THUCYDIDES. 


surrendered  at  discretion.  Tliat  is,  they  agreed  to  leave 
the  decision  of  their  fate  to  judges  sent  from  Lace- 
dtemon,  who  should  “  punish  the  guilty,  hut  no  one 
contrary  to  justice.”  What  the  Lacedaemonian  ideas 
of  justice  were  they  soon  learnt  by  terrible  experience, 
rive  special  commissioners  arrived  from  Lacedaemon. 
No  charge  was  brought  forward  against  the  garrison  : 
they  were  simply  asked,  “  Had  they,  during  the  present 
war,  done  any  service  in  any  way  to  the  Lacedaemonians 
or  their  allies  %  ”  There  could  be  only  one  answer  :  the 
question  meant  a  judicial  murder  :  and  the  prisoners 
asked  leave  to  defend  themselves.  One  of  the  earliest 
critics  of  Thucydides- -Dionysius  of  Halicarnassus — - 
reckons  this  defence  as  one  of  the  finest  specimens  of 
his  oratory. 

They  feared — they  said — that  their  fate  was  deter¬ 
mined  already  :  they  were  to  be  sacrificed  to  the  ven¬ 
geance  of  Thebes.  Yet  they  would  remind  the  allies 
of  their  good  service  done  to  Greece  in  old  times,  when 
Tliebes  had  betrayed  it.  If  they  found  themselves  now 
ranged  on  the  side  of  Athens,  it  was  because  Lacedae¬ 
mon  had  rejected  their  application  for  aid  when  hard 
pressed  by  their  enemies  the  Thebans  :  and  it  was 
the  Thebans  who  had  now  attacked  them  first,  and 
that  in  a  time  of  peace.  It  would  be  a  monstrous 
thing  to  blot  from  the  community  of  Greece  a  to^vn 
whose  name  had  been  inscribed,  by  the  national  grati¬ 
tude,  on  the  votive  tripod  at  Delphi.  Such  a  deed 
would  be  a  stain  on  the  character  of  Lacedaemon  for 
ever.  There  is  much  pathos  in  their  concluding 
words : — 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PLATTE  A. 


79 


“  But  we  must  bring  this  pleading  to  a  close — hard 
its  that  is,  when  we  feel  our  lives  are  in  peril  of  closing 
with  it.  We  have  done  :  only  protesting,  that  it  was 
not  to  the  Thebans  we  surrendered  our  city — rather 
than  that,  we  would  have  preferred  to  die  by  famine, 
most  wretched  as  -it  is  of  all  deaths ;  it  was  to  you 
we  trusted,  when  we  gave  in.  It  were  but  fair,  then, 
if  we  fail  to  persuade  you,  to  put  us  back  in  the 
position  in  which  we  were,  and  let  us  take  our  choice 
of  the  fate  that  may  await  us.  We  adjure  you  not 
to  let  us  Platseans,  once  so  zealous  in  the  defence  of 
Greece,  now  suppliants  here  before  you,  Lacedaemonians, 
be  delivered  up  out  of  your  hands  and  your  pledged 
honour  to  our  bitterest  enemies,  the  Thebans  :  nay, 
be  our  preservers  rather,  and  do  not,  while  giving 
freedom  to  the  other  Greeks,  leave  us  to  destruc¬ 
tion.”— (III.  59.) 

The  Thebans  feared  the  effect  of  this  appeal.  They 
replied — or  Thucydides  replies — at  considerable  length. 
How  far  these  speeches,  as  we  have  them,  represent 
what  was  actually  said,  can  be  only  matter  of  con¬ 
jecture.  Mitford  holds,  with  good  reason,  that  they 
are  “not  likely  to  have  been  very  exactly  reported;” 
Grote  places  “  fuU  confidence  in  them,  so'  far  as  the 
substance  goes.”  The  form  and  arrangement  of  both 
the  defence  and  the  rejoinder  show  that  the  historian 
would  himself  have  made  an  admirable  pleader. 

The  Platseans  had  claimed  credit,  said  their  accusers, 
for  not  “  Medising  ”  at  the  time  of  the  great  war  : 
but  they  would  have  joined  the  Medes  if  the 


BOSTON  COLLEGE  LIBKAiiY 
CHESTNUT  HILL,  MASS. 


80 


THUCYDIDES. 


Athenians  had.  And  they  (the  Thebans)  had  not 
“  Medised  ”  as  a  state — it  was  the  act  only  of  a  small 
despotic  faction.  They  had  shown  their  regard  for 
the  liberties  of  Greece  by  their  steadfast  opposition 
to  the  encroachments  of  Athens — as  dangerous  an 
enemy  to  liberty  as  ever  the  Persian  was.  The  real 
traitors  to  Greece  were  those  who,  like  the  Platseans, 
followed  willingly  the  lead  of  Athens  in  all  her  am¬ 
bitious  designs,  instead  of  joining  the  general  league 
against  her,  or  preserving  neutrality  as  they  had  been 
urged  to  do.  As  to  the  attack  made  on  their  city, 
of  which  they  complained,  the  Thebans  had  come 
there  on  the  invitation  of  some  of  the  chief  men  in 
Plataea  itself,  who  were  desirous  of  joining  the  Boeo¬ 
tian  confederacy  :  they  had  come  in  peace,  to  pro¬ 
claim  a  new  constitution  ;  they  had  been  received  as 
enemies,  and  ‘their  men,  in  violation  of  a  solemn 
promise,  treacherously  massacred.  For  this  they  now 
demanded  vengeance — “  in  order  that  men  might  learn 
in  future  not  to  seek  fair  excuses  for  evil  deeds.” 

The  Lacedaemonian  commission  decided  that  the 
men  of  Plataea,  having  rejected  the  position  of  neutrals 
which  had  been  repeatedly  and  formally  offered  them, 
had  placed  themselves  outside  the  laws  of  war — • 
such  as  they  were.  They  put  to  each  man  singly 
the  hopeless  question,  “  Had  he  done  any  service  to 
them  or  to  their  allies  And  as  each  made  the  only 
answer  that  was  possible,  he  was  led  away  to  death. 
Two  hundred  Plateaus  and  twenty-five  Athenians  who 
formed  part  of  the  garrison  were  thus  killed  in  cold 
blood.  The  Athenians,  in  whose  cause  they  died, 


THE  SIEGE  OF  PL  ATM  A. 


81 


seem  to  have  made  no  effort  to  save  them,  nor  to  have 
entered  any  special  protest  against  the  deed.  Thucy¬ 
dides  narrates  the  hare  fact  here,  as  he  does  the 
slaughter  of  the  citizens  of  Mitylen^,  in  a  few  words, 
without  an  expression  of  censure  in  either  case.  It 
seems  quite  possible  that  public  opinion,  among  the 
Greeks  of  those  days,  saw  in  such  treatment  of  their 
prisoners  of  war  nothing  to  call  for  exceptional  repro¬ 
bation.  The  women  who  had  remained  within  the 
walls  were  sold  as  slaves,  the  town  itself  razed  to  the 
ground,  and  the  name  of  Platsea  was  for  the  present, 
as  its  citizens  had  so  pathetically  foreboded,  “  blotted 
out  of  the  national  family  of  Greeks.”*  It  was  all 
done,  says  Thucydides,  to  gratify  the  unrelenting  en 
mity  of  the  Thebans,  whose  support  in  this  war  was 
felt  to  be  of  the  utmost  importance  by  their  Pelopon¬ 
nesian  allies. 

*  It  was  restored  and  garrisoned  by  the  Spartans  forty  years 
afterwards,  as  a  blow  to  the  pride  of  Thebes,  with  which  state 
they  were  then  at  war ;  was  again  destroyed  utterly  by  the 
Thebans,  and  restored  again  by  Alexander. 


A.C.S.S.  voL  vi. 


F 


CHAPTER  VII. 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  the  siege  of  Plataca  was 
begun  (b.c.  429)  the  Athenians  met  with  a  serious 
reverse  in  an  expedition  against  the  revolted  Chalci- 
dians  in  Thrace,  in  which  they  lost  above  400  of  their 
best  men  and  all  their  generals.  It  was  far  more  than 
compensated  by  the  two  brilliant  victories  won  for 
them  in  the  Corinthian  gulf  by  Phormio  (unquestion¬ 
ably  the  ablest  of  all  their  admirals  in  this  war)  over 
the  confederate  fleet — chiefly  made  up  from  Corirdh 
and  Sicyon.  This  was  the  first  serious  trial  of  naval 
strength  between  the  two  parties  since  the  affair  off 
Corcyra.  In  the  first  of  the  two  sea-fights  the  con¬ 
federates  (who  had  forty -five  ships  against  twenty) 
adopted  a  singular  formation  to  await  the  attack  of  the 
Athenians.  They  formed  their  ships  into  a  circle,  with 
their  prows  outwards  and  their  sterns  in,  as  wide  as 
they  could  without  giving  the  enemy  room  to  sail 
through.  Inside  they  stationed  all  the  small  craft 
which  accompanied  the  expedition,  and  also  five  of 
their  fastest  war-galleys,  which  were  to  move  out  at 
once  and  give  support  at  any  point  where  the  enemy 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


83 


might  attack.  N’either  this  ingenious  plan,  nor  their 
great  superiority  in  numbers,  saved  them  from  an  utter 
defeat.  In  fact,  in  the  position  they  had  taken  up, 
their  numbers  did  but  hamper  them  in  a  rough  sea. 
Phormio,  with  his  faster  galleys  and  better  -  trained 
crews,  kept  moving  round  the  outside  of  their  circle, 
“knowing  that  he  could  choose  his  own  moment  for 
attack,”  and  waiting  for  the  increased  breeze  which 
generally  came  with  the  dawn.  It  came,  and  the  con¬ 
federate  ships  were  unable  to  keep  their  distances :  the 
circle  grew  narrower  and  narrower,  and  their  vessels 
fouled  each  other.  Then  Phormio  saw  his  opportunity, 
and  won  an  easy  victory.  Thereupon  the  confederate 
admirals  were  practically  superseded  by  having  “coun¬ 
sellors  ”  (like  the  French  republican  “  commissioners  ”) 
sent  to  them  from  Sparta.  But,  in  spite  of  commission¬ 
ers  and  strong  reinforcements,  the  result  of  a  second 
engagement,  under  even  a  greater  disparity  of  strength 
than  before,  was  equally  disastrous.  It  was  in  vain 
that  the  Spartan  commissioners  made  an  earnest  ha¬ 
rangue  to  the  fleet, — introducing  a  point  which,  as 
Grote  has  well  observed,  “was  rarely  touched  upon  by 
generals  on  the  eve  of  battle,”  and  which  showed  a 
consciousness  that  their  men  had  but  little  heart  to 
fight  the  Athenians  again.  “We  shall  make  at  least 
as  good  dispositions  for  battle  as  your  late  command¬ 
ers,  and  we  will  give  no  man  an  excuse  for  being  a 
coward  :  if  any  choose  so  to  be,  he  shall  be  punished 
as  he  deserves.”  The  vicissitudes  of  this  second  en¬ 
gagement  were  remarkable,  and  are  told  in  the  his¬ 
torian’s  most  lucid  style.  Phormio  had  still  but  hia 


84 


THUCYDIDES, 


twenty  galleys,  while  the  enemy  had  now  collected 
seventy-five.  It  was  therefore  his  object  to  avoid  a 
battle — especially  where  he  had  not  much  sea-room — 
until  his  own  reinforcements  could  come  up.  The 
manoeuvres  continued  for  six  days.  Then  the  con¬ 
federates  made  a  feint  against  Naupactus,  an  Athenian 
settlement  within  the  gulf,  which  was  quite  undefended. 
This  drew  Phormio  into  the  narrower  water,  in  his 
anxiety  to  protect  the  town  :  and  then  the  Pelopon¬ 
nesians  suddenly  changed  their  course,  cut  off  nine  of 
his  ships,  and  drove  them  ashore. 

“  Meanwhile  their  own  twenty  ships  of  the  right 
wing  [these  were  the  fastest  sailers]  went  in  chase 
of  the  eleven  Athenian  galleys  which  had  made  their 
escape,  when  the  sudden  change  of  course  took  place, 
into  the  wider  channel.  But  all  except  one  succeeded 
in  making  Naupactus  before  they  were  overtaken, 
and  ranged  themselves  in  line,  with  their  prows  out¬ 
wards,  off  the  temple  of  Apollo,  prepared  for  action  in 
case  the  enemy  should  follow  them  under  the  land. 
They  came  up  presently,  and  were  singing  the  paean  as 
they  sailed,  considering  that  they  had  won  a  victory, 
and  the  one  Athenian  galley  that  lagged  behind  the 
others  was  being  chased  by  a  Leucadian,  which  was 
far  ahead  of  her  consorts.  hTow  there  chanced  to  he 
a  merchant-vessel  riding  at  anchor  in  deep  water,  round 
which  the  Athenian,  being  sufficiently  in  advance, 
made  a  sharp  turn,  struck  the  Leucadian  that  was 
chasing  her  amidships,  and  so  sank  her.  There  fell 
a  panic  on  the  Peloponnesians  at  this  sudden  and  un- 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


85 


looked-for  exploit ;  so  much  so,  that  running  in  chase 
as  they  were  without  much  order,  in  all  the  confidence 
of  victory,  some  of  their  galleys  even  stopped  rowing 
and  did  not  continue  their  course,  waiting  for  the 
main  squadron — the  worst  thing  they  could  have 
done,  with  the  enemy  at  such  close  quarters — and 
some,  ^froni  want  of  knowmg  the  coast,  got  into  shoal- 
water.  When  the  Athenians  saw  all  this,  their  cour¬ 
age  rose,  and  with  one  unanimous  shout  they  raised 
their  battle-cry  and  made  at  them.  What  with  their 
unlucky  mistakes,  and  the  confusion  they  had  now 
got  into,  the  enemy  stood  their  ground  hut  a  very  little 
while,  and  then  turned  and  made  for  Panormus,  whence 
they  had  started.  The  Athenians  followed  in  chase, 
took  six  of  the  nearest  galleys,  and  recovered  their  own 
which  the  enemy  had  driven  ashore  at  the  beginning 
of  the  battle,  and  taken  in  tow.  Of  the  men,  they 
killed  some,  and  some  few  they  made  prisoners.  Now 
on  board  the  Leucadian  galley,  which  was  sunk  by 
the  turn  round  the  merchantman,  was  Timocrates  the 
Lacedaemonian :  when  the  ship  was  sinking,  he  stab¬ 
bed  himself,  and  his  body  was  washed  ashore  in  the 
harbour  at  Naupactus.” — (II.  91,  92.) 

The  confederate  admirals  now  sought  to  retrieve 
their  defeat  by  a  bold  stroke  in  another  direction. 
So  confident  were  the  Athenians,  according  to  their 
historian,  of  their  superiority  at  sea,  that  their  port 
and  arsenal  at  Piraeus  had  been  left  wholly  unpro¬ 
tected.  It  was  resolved  to  make  a  sudden  dash  upon 
it.  As  the  siege  of  Plataea  had  been  undertaken  to 


86 


THUCYDIDES. 


gratify  the  Thebans,  so  this  stab  at  the  very  heart 
of  Athens  was  suggested  by  the  bitterest  of  her  ene¬ 
mies  and  the  greatest  sufferer  in  her  home  market  by 
the  Athenian  blockading  ships.  It  was  from  Megara 
the  suggestion  came.  The  crews  from  the  allied  fleet 
marched  overland  to  Nisaea,  the  Megarian  port,  manned 
forty  vessels  which  lay  there,  and  set  sail — hut  not 
direct  for  Athens ;  they  stopped  to  sack  the  island  of 
Salamis  by  the  way.  They  said  it  was  an  unfavour¬ 
able  wind  that  delayed  them  :  but  they  might  have 
sailed  into  the  harbour  of  Athens  easily  enough — “  if 
they  had  had  the  spirit  not  to  hesitate,  and  the  wind 
would  not  have  hindered  it” — is  the  contemptuous 
criticism  of  the  military  historian.  As  it  was,  the  fire- 
signals  from  Salamis  gave  warning  to  Athens  of  the 
danger ;  at  dawn  the  home  fleet  moved  out  to  meet  the 
enemy  at  Salamis,  while  the  land-troops  mounted  guard 
at  the  harbour. 

The  confederates  contented  themselves  with  their 
plunder,  and  returned  in  all  haste  to  Nissea,  whence 
they  had  started.  “Their  galleys  also  caused  them 
some  uneasiness,  as  they  had  been  lying  high  and  dry 
for  some  time,  and  were  anything  but  water-tight.” 
So  little  did  their  admirals  seem  to  have  known  of 
the  very  essentials  of  naval  warfare.  The  Athenians 
took  the  warning,  and  secured  their  harbour  by  a 
boom,  or  something  of  the  kind,  and  took  other  pre¬ 
cautions  for  its  future  defence. 

Towards  the  winter  of  the  year,  Sitalces  of  Thrace 
made  an  important  expedition  against  Perdiccas  of 
Macedonia,  partly  as  a  diversion  in  favour  of  his 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


87 


allies  the  Athenians.  He  led  with  hiin  an  enormous 
force,  swelled  on  the  march,  by  the  contingents  of  the 
various  tribes  who  more  or  less  acknowledged  his 
sovereignty,  till  it  reached  150,000  men.  An  Athe¬ 
nian  naval  squadron  was  to  have  co-operated  on  the 
coast :  but,  as  is  the  case  so  often  with  combined 
operations,  the  dispositions  failed.  The  expedition 
was  undertaken  so  late  in  the  year,  that  the  Athenians 
■ — not  believing,  says  Thucydides,  that  their  allies 
would  undertake  it  at  all — never  despatched  a  fleet, 
but  only  envoys  and  complimentary  presents.  The 
Thracian  king  entered  into  negotiations  with  the  INlace- 
donian,  and  the  invading  host  returned  as  it  came, 
after  thirty  days  of  ravaging  and  plunder. 

Phormio  and  his  victorious  fleet  returned  to  Athens 
at  the  close  of  the  winter  with  the  captured  ships  and 
prisoners.  The  freemen  among  them,  we  are  told, 
we.-e  exchanged  by  regular  cartel  with  the  enemy. 
The  slaves  would  be  reckoned  with  the  other  materials 
of  war,  and  their  condition  would  not  be  much  affected, 
whether  they  worked  for  Athens  or  Sparta. 

The  following  campaign  began  as  usual.  “  As  soon 
as  the  corn  was  ripe,”  Archidamus  and  his  allies  made 
their  third  inroad  on  the  flelds  of  Attica.  The  Athe¬ 
nian  cavalry  kept  them  somewhat  in  check,  and  pre¬ 
vented  them  from  carrying  their  destruction  into  the 
immediate  neighbourhood  of  the  city. 

This  year  was  marked  by  the  revolt  from  Athenian 
rule  of  the  important  island  of  Lesbos  (b.c.  428). 
Its  powerful  capital,  Mitylene,  had  long  been  impa¬ 
tient  of  a  dependent  position,  and  had  contemplated 


88 


THUCYDIDES. 


such  a  movement  even  before  the  waTj  but  was  waiting 
to  be  better  prepared.  Events  Avere  somewhat  hastened 
in  consequence  of  the  Athenians  receiving  warning 
of  the  design  from  Methymna,  the  one  town  in  the 
island  which  remained  faithful  to  its  allegiance.  At 
first  they  were  loath  to  believe  in  such  an  alarming 
addition  to  their  difficulties,  “crippled  as  they  Aveie 
already  by  the  war  and  the  pestilence;”  but  they 
found  the  news  was  too  true,  and  sent  to  demand  of 
the  islanders  to  give  up  their  fleet  and  dismantle  their 
new  fortifications.  They  flatly  refused,  and  even 
risked  a  battle  with  the  Athenian  fleet  sent  to  enforce 
the  demand.  As  Avas  to  be  expected,  their  raAv  sailors 
were  easily  beaten;  and  then — anxious  to  save  their 
fleet,  if  possible  —  the  Mityleneans  asked  for  terms, 
Avhich  the  Athenian  commanders  Avere  willing  to  grant, 
“having  fears  on  their  OAvn  part  that  they  Avere  not 
strong  enough  to  carry  on  hostilities  against  all  Lesbos 
united.”  The  Lesbians  sent  delegates  to  Athens  to 
negotiate;  but,  at  the  same  time,  having  no  great 
confidence  in  the  result,  they  sent  an  embassy  to  ask 
help  from  Sparta. 

Their  envoys  were  admitted  to  an  audience  at  Olym¬ 
pia,  at  the  great  national  festival  of  Greece.  Their 
spokesman  is  reported  as  defending  his  countrymen 
against  any  charge  Athens  might  bring  against  them 
of  a  breach  of  faith.  They  were  conscious  that  their 
case  might  have  an  ugly  look,  even  in  the  eyes  of  the 
enemies  of  Athens;  that  “it  might  possibly  seem  some¬ 
what  base,  after  being  treated  honourably  in  time  of 
peace,  to  revolt  from  her  in  her  hour  of  danger.”  But 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


89 


they  professed  to  he  alarmed  at  the  prospect  of  the 
future.  They  had  admitted  the  suzerainty  of  Athens, 
in  order  to  defend  the  liberties  of  Greece  against  the 
Persians  ;  but  Athens  had  gradually  reduced  all  her 
weaker  allies  under  as  complete  a  despotism  as  the 
Persian.  Were  they  to  wait  until,  when  their  possible 
allies  had  all  been  reduced  to  this  state,  they  should 
themselves  be  the  last  to  be  absorbed?  The  only  chance 
for  Lesbos  was  to  anticipate  their  would-be  tyrants, 
and  strike  a  blow  for  liberty  before  their  chance  grew 
desperate.  Naturally,  they  said,  they  were  speaking 
for  their  own  interests;  but  none  the  less  was  it  for  the 
interest  of  Sparta  to  embrace  the  opportunity,  and  at¬ 
tack  her  great  enemy  where  she  was  most  vulnerable, 
in  and  by  the  means  of  one  of  her  most  important 
colonies.  There  is  no  word  of  real  complaint  as  to  the 
treatment  of  the  islanders  by  the  sovereign  state.  True, 
it  may  be  said  that,  though  the  defence  is  put  into  the 
mouth  of  a  IMitylenean,  the  language  is  really  that  of 
Thucydides  the  Athenian;  but  there  is  no  reason  here 
or  elsewhere  to  suspect  him  of  unfairness,  and  there  is 
nothing  on  record  to  show  that  the  bearing  of  Athens 
towards  her  subject-allies  was  not  exercised  for  theii 
interests  as  well  as  for  her  own.  When  the  catastrophe 
of  the  revolt  comes  to  be  considered,  it  is  well  to  bear 
all  its  circumstances  in  mind. 

The  arguments  of  the  Mitylenean  envoys,  whatever 
they  were  worth,  fell  upon  very  willing  ears.  The 
island  was  received  into  the  confederation,  and  the 
Lacedaemonians  took  occasion  of  the  supposed  Athe¬ 
nian  difficulties  to  order  an  invasion  of  Attica  by  the 


90 


THUCYDIDES. 


several  contingents  in  strong  force.  But  Athens  made 
an  immense  effort  to  meet  the  occasion.  Without 
moving  a  galley  from  Lesbos,  they  raised  a  levy  eji 
masse  of  all  except  the  very  highest  rank  of  citizens, 
and  equipped  a  fleet  of  a  hundred  sail  to  face  the 
astonished  Lacedaemonians.  The  latter  found  their 
allies  not  nearly  so  forward  as  themselves.  “They 
were  busy  gathering  in  their  harvest ;  they  were  sick 
of  expeditions  into  Attica;”  and  so  the  appointed 
gathering  at  the  Isthmus  proved  a  failure,  and  the 
Lacedaemonians  went  home.  At  the  same  time,  the 
Mityleneans  made  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  reduce 
their  impracticable  neighbour,  ISIethymna,  which  main¬ 
tained  a  stubborn  loyalty  to  Athens.  But  they  were 
soon  themselves  closely  invested  by  the  Athenian  ad¬ 
miral,  Baches,  who  was  sent  there  with  a  large  force, 
and  who  drew  a  line  of  circumvallation  round  the 
town,  while  his  fleet  strictly  blockaded  their  harbour. 
A  Lacedaemonian  envoy  nevertheless  succeeded  in 
creeping  in  through  a  water-course,  and  bade  them  hold 
out,  for  that  the  allies  would  make  a  strong  diversion 
in  their  favour  by  an  invasion  of  Attica  in  force. 

The  invasion  of  the  Athenian  territory,  which  the 
Lacedaemonians  had  promised  should  soon  distract  the 
attention  and  the  forces  of  their  enemy  from  the  siege 
of  Mitylen^,  took  place  in  the  spring.  It  was  headed 
by  the  Spartan  Cleomenes,  now  acting  as  regent  for  his 
nephew  Pleistoanax,  who  was  yet  a  minor.  “  They 
ravaged,”  says  our  author,  “not  only  the  districts  which 
they  had  laid  waste  before,  wherever  anything  had 
grown  again,  but  all  that  they  had  left  unvisited  in 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


91 


their  former  incursions :  and  this  was  the  sorest  raid 
of  all  for  the  Athenians,  except  the  second.”  Eut 
nothing  could  force  Athens  to  relax  her  grasp  upon  her 
revolted  dependency;  and  the  garrison  of  Mitylene, 
suffering  now  from  famine,  and  still  seeing  no  aid  from 
Sparta,  made  such  terms  as  they  could  with  Paches. 
They  opened  their  gates  to  his  army,  and  only  bar¬ 
gained  that  he  should  put  none  of  them  to  death  or 
sell  them  for  slaves,  till  they  should  have  had  an 
opportunity  of  pleading  their  cause  at  Athens.  Thither 
the  leading  citizens,  who  had  taken  an  active  part  in  the 
movement  for  independence,  were  sent  for  public  trial. 
Seven  days  too  late,  the  Lacedaemonian  fleet,  so  long 
expected,  but  which  had  been  wasting  the  days  so 
precious  to  the  Mityleneans  in  some  minor  operations, 
arrived  in  the  neighbourhood  only  to  find  the  city  in 
the  hands  of  the  enemy. 

There  was  no  hesitation  at  Athens  as  to  the  punish¬ 
ment  of  the  men  whom  they  looked  upon  in  the  light 
of  the  most  ungrateful  of  all  their  dependants.  The 
public  vote  was  for  death,  not  only  to  the  citizens 
whom  Paches  had  selected  and  sent  home  as  most 
deeply  imiDlicated  in  the  revolt,  but  to  all  Mityleneans 
who  were  able  to  bear  arms — probably  not  less  than 
six  thousand — and  slavery  to  their  women  and  chil¬ 
dren.  But  this  hasty  popular  vote  was  followed,  as  is 
not  unfrequently  the  case,  by  something  like  a  popular 
repentance ;  and  the  Mitylenean  deputies  and  their 
few  friends  at  Athens  took  advantage  of  the  feeling  to 
get  the  question  brought  forward  afresh.  And  here 
Thucydides  first  brings  into  view  a  man  who  played 


92 


THUCYDIDES. 


a  leading  part  in  the  commons  of  Athens — who  was 
better  abused,  probably,  than  any  man  of  his  day, 
figuring  not  merely  in  the  pages  of  history,  but  as 
the  never-failing  subject  of  satirical  comedy — with 
whom  the  fortunes  of  Thucydides  himseK  are  thought 
to  have  been  very  closely  connected,  and  as  to  whose 
real  character  historians  and  scholars  widely  differ  to 
this  day.  He  is  introduced  to  us  with  an  abruptness 
more  common  with  early  than  with  recent  historians, 
simply  by  name — Cleon,  son  of  Cleaenetus — as  the 
uncompromising  supporter,  from  first  to  last,  of  a 
policy  of  extermination  towards  revolted  subjects. 
Such  character  as  Thucvdides  here  gives  of  him  is 
summed  up  in  a  very  few  words — “  One  of  the  most 
violent  of  the  citizens  in  every  way,  and  at  that  time 
possessing  unbounded  influence  with  the  commons.” 
He  speaks  of  him  again,  in  a  subsequent  passage,  as  a 
dishonest  politician  and  a  reckless  slanderer ;  *  but,  as 
will  be  seen  hereafter,  there  are  reasons  for  receiving 
the  historian’s  judgment  in  this  particular  case  with 
some  degree  of  caution.  This  Cleon  was  a  man  of  the 
people  in  every  sense — he,  or  at  least  his  father,  was 
said  to  have  been  a  tanner — and  he  undoubtedly  pos¬ 
sessed,  as  would  be  admitted  both  by  his  enemies  and 
his  apologists,  the  popular  gifts  of  a  strong  voice  and 
a  fluent  tongue ;  to  which  might  be  added  the  no  less 
popular  qualifications  of  abundant  self-confidence,  un¬ 
qualified  opinions,  and  unscrupulous  dealing  with  oppo¬ 
nents.  Hot  what  either  Athenian  or  English  politicians 
would  call  a  “  gentleman,”  by  any  means ;  but  an  able 


*  V.  16. 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLESE. 


93 


and  vigrorous  debater,  and  a  party  cliief  of  unquestion¬ 
able  power.  He  had  already,  before  our  historian 
introduces  him,  worked  his  way  into  public  notice  as 
an  opponent  of  Pericles,  and  probably  was  one  of  the 
many  who,  without  that  great  statesman’s  qualifications, 
aimed  at  succeeding  to  his  place  in  Athens.  He  now 
came  forward  to  denounce  in  the  strongest  terms  the 
w.3iik-minded  policy  which  would  reverse  the  merciless 
but  (as  he  argued)  just  decree  which  had  been  passed 
against  MitylenA  How  far  his  speech  on  the  second 
discussion,  which  Thucydides  gives  at  length,  is  real 
or  imaginary,  we  cannot  tell;  but  it  may  at  least  be 
received  as  setting  forth  the  view  taken  of  the  case 
by  a  large  party  at  Athens. 

Very  much  of  his  harangue  sounds  like  a  succession 
of  ironical  paradoxes,  from  the  mouth  of  such  a  speaker. 
We  might  believe  that  it  embodied  rather  the  opin¬ 
ions  of  Thucydides  himself  than  those  of  the  popular 
demagogue.  Cleon  sets  forth  the  danger  of  allowing 
eloquent  speakers  to  turn  the  Assembly  from  their 
sober  judgment :  he  puts  before  them  a  picture  of 
themselves  which  was  not  far  from  the  truth,  but 
which  we  should  not  expect  to  find  thus  drawn  by  the 
hand  of  a  popular  leader.  Then  he  proceeds : — 

“  You  conduct  these  political  debates  on  false  prin¬ 
ciples.  You  attend  such  discussions  as  you  would 
a  theatre,  —  as  a  mere  audience,  and  you  take  your 
facts  from  hearsay ;  deciding  on  the  feasibility  of  any 
enterprise  from  the  language  of  some  plausible  orator, 
and  for  your  view  of  past  events  depending  not  so 


94 


THUCYDIDES. 


nmch  on  the  evidence  of  your  own  eyes  as  on  the 
criticisms  of  clever  theorists  :  readier  than  any  men  I 
know  to  he  taken  in  by  a  specious  paradox,  and  to 
shrink  from  carrying  out  what  you  have  solemnly  de¬ 
termined;  ever  the  slaves  of  the  last  new  whim,  scorners 
of  sober  use  and  wont.  What  each  would  like  best  is  to 
be  an  orator  himself ;  or,  if  that  cannot  be,  then  you 
vie,  as  it  were,  with  the  orators  so  far  as  not  to  seem  to 
be  following  their  lead  in  thought,  but  to  anticipate 
any  clever  turn  by  your  applause,  and  to  be  quick  in 
catching  the  sense  of  what  is  suggested  before  the  words 
are  spoken, — as  you  are  slow  to  foresee  their  possible 
consequences.  You  are  always  seeking  for  something 
grander,  if  I  may  so  express  it,  than  the  facts  of  daily 
life,  yet  lack  common-sense  to  judge  of  the  facts  before 
your  eyes.  In  short,  you  are  taken  captive  by  the 
pleasures  of  the  ear,  and  you  are  more  like  an  audience 
sitting  at  a  disputation  of  rhetoricians,  than  men  gravely 
consulting  on  affairs  of  state.” — (III.  38.) 

It  is  Thucydides,  surely  —  the  grave  and  caustic 
aristocratical  politician — who  delivers  himself  of  these 
home  truths  to  his  countrymen ;  not  the  demagogue 
whom  he  at  least  represents  as  the  mob-orator,  swaying 
their  passions  by  violent  language,  and  reckless  of  all 
political  morality.  This  portion  of  Cleon’s  reputed 
speech  reads  almost  like  a  passage  from  Aristophanes 
paraphrased  into  sounding  prose, — where  that  wonder¬ 
ful  satirist  is  sketching  the  character  and  habits  of  this 
very  same  commons  of  Athens,  as  led  away  and  deluded 
by  this  man  Cleon  and  others  of  his  type.  However, 


THE  FATE  OF  MITYLENE. 


95 


after  this  remarkable  exordium,  the  speaker  goes  on  to 
state  the  case  very  forcibly,  and  with  no  manifest  un¬ 
fairness,  against  the  unhappy  Mityleneans.  They  had 
no  excuse :  they  had  no  complaint  to  make  against 
Athens,  by  their  own  confession;  they  had  been  livmg 
in  practical  independence,  under  their  own  laws,  treated 
with  all  honour  and  consideration;  if  Athens  had  done 
wrong  at  all,  it  was  in  treating  them  better  than  her 
other  dependencies;  “for  it  is  the  common  trick  of 
human  nature  to  despise  those  who  pay  us  court,  and 
to  look  up  with  respect  to  those  who  never  stoop  an 
inch  to  us.”  He  contends  that  justice,  as  well  as  the 
interest  of  Athens,  called  for  signal  punishment  of  these 
wanton  rebels.  “  By  a  weaker  course  you  will  fail  to 
conciliate  them,  while  you  will  condemn  yourselves;  for 
if  they  did  right  to  revolt,  then  you  had  no  right  to 
rule.  And  if  you  are  determined,  even  without  such 
right,  to  maintain  your  dominion,  you  must  also  so  far 
disregard  right,  and  punish  these  men  from  expediency; 
or  else  throw  up  your  dominion,  and  adopt  the  high 
moral  tone  when  you  can  do  so  in  safe  obscurity.” — 
“  Punish  them,  then,  as  they  deserve,  and  make  of  them 
an  unmistakable  example  to  your  other  dependencies, 
that  the  penalty  for  revolt,  in  any  case,  is  death.  If 
once  they  feel  this,  you  will  not  so  often  have  to  hold 
your  hands  from  your  enemies  in  order  to  defend  your¬ 
selves  against  your  allies.” 

Cleon’s  speech  was  answered  by  one  Diodotus — of 
whom  we  know  nothing  besides.  Even  he,  while  he 
strongly  urges  on  his  countrymen  some  modification 
of  the  terrible  decree,  does  so  on  the  ground  of  political 


96 


THUCYDIDES. 


expediency, — not  of  mercy.  “  As  for  pity  or  indul¬ 
gence,”  he  says,  “  I  would  not  have  you  swayed  at  all 
by  such  considerations.”  So  comparatively  modern 
a  feeling  is  mercy,  as  a  general  rule,  to  a  conquered 
enemy,  especially  when  that  enemy  had  once  stood  in 
the  position  of  a  friend.  But  a  mistaken  severity 
in  this  case,  Diodotus  argues,  far  from  stamping  out 
rebellion,  might  defeat  its  own  object :  it  might  drive 
to  desperation  any  dependency  which  might  possi¬ 
bly  revolt  in  the  future.  Again,  if  they  included  the 
commons  of  Mitylene  in  the  punishment,  as  had  been 
decreed,  they  would  be  sacrificing  the  immense  advan¬ 
tage  which  Athens  now  possessed,  of  being  looked  upon 
more  or  less  as  a  friend  by  the  commons  of  every  state  : 
she  would  lose  the  support  in  such  cases  of  the  masses, 
now  almost  always  inclined  to  her  interests.  Let  them 
put  the  leading  citizens,  whom  Baches  had  sent  home 
as  the  most  guilty,  formally  on  their  trial,  and  let  the 
rest  live  unharmed. — (III.  40.) 

By  a  very  small  majority,  the  milder  proposal  of 
Diodotus  was  carried  in  the  Assembly.  But  the  order 
for  the  summary  execution  of  all  the  citizens  had  been 
despatched  the  evening  before  to  the  admiral  at  Mity¬ 
lene,  and  the  galley  which  carried  it  was  already  far 
on  her  way.  Then  began  a  race  for  life  and  death. 

“  At  once  they  despatched  another  vessel  in  all  haste, 
fearing  that  unless  this  second  outstripped  the  other,  it 
would  find  the  town  and  its  inhabitants  already  de¬ 
stroyed  :  for  the  first  had  the  start  by  about  a  day  and 
a  night.  The  Mitylenean  delegates  had  supplied  the 


THE  FATE  UF  Mil  l  LEXE. 


97 


second  galley  liberally  with  meal  and  wine,  and 
promised  large  bounties  to  the  rowers  if  they  reached 
the  island  first;  the  men  ate,  as  they  sat  at  thfir 
oars,  a  mixture  of  meal  with  wine  and  oil,  rowing  and 
sleeping  by  relays.  And  as  there  chanced  to  be  no 
wind  against  them,  and  the  first  galley  made  no  great 
haste,  as  upon  a  hateful  errand,  while  the  other  pressed 
on  in  this  fashion,  the  one  arrived  only  just  so  much 
in  advance  that  Paches  had  read  the  letter  containing 
the  decree,  and  was  about  to  put  the  order  into  execu¬ 
tion,  when  the  second  reached  shore  after  it,  and  stopped 
the  massacre.  So  narrowly  did  Mitylen^  escape  from 
peril.”— (III.  49.) 

Even  the  tender  mercies  of  this  war  were  cruel. 
The  main  population  of  Mitylen^  was  spared  ;  but  those 
who  had  been  sent  prisoners  to  Athens  as  having  led 
the  revolt  were  put  to  death — upwards  of  a  thousand 
of  the  most  influential  citizens.  The  fortifications  of 
the  place  were  dismantled,  and  its  ^  fleet  confiscated. 
The  whole  island  of  Lesbos,  except  the  one  faithful 
town  of  Methymna,  was  divided  into  lots,  which  were 
assigned  to  Athenian  citizens,  who  let  them  out  to  be 
farmed  by  the  natives.  If  a  terrible  example  could 
have  bound  the  allies  of  Athens  to  their  allegiance,  the 
fate  of  Lesbos  might  well  have  afibrded  it. 


4.C.S.8.  voL  vi. 


a 


CHAPTEE  Yin. 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 

The  island  of  Corcyra  was  again  to  be  the  scene  of 
troubles  in  which  both  the  great  contending  Powers 
were  concerned.  Corinth  had  not  lost  sight  of  her 
ambitious  and  refractory  daughter.  Her  fleet  had 
carried  off  from  the  island,  after  the  sea-fight  at  the 
beginning  of  the  war,  some  8000  prisoners.*  Of 
these,  250  belonged  to  the  highest  families ;  and 
these,  probably  to  their  own  surprise,  while  their 
meaner  countrymen  were  all  sold  for  slaves,  found 
themselves  well  treated,  and  held  in  a  kind  of  honour¬ 
able  safe- custody  at  Corinth.  The  Corinthians  had 
their  own  object  in  view.  In  the  fifth  year  of  the  war 
these  men  were  sent  home  to  their  island,  nominally 
on  bail  for  a  large  promised  ransom,  but  really,  says 
Thucydides,  “  on  condition  of  their  undertaking  to 
bring  over  the  island  to  the  Corinthians.”  They  began 
by  diplomatic  intrigues;  but  they  found  the  demo¬ 
cratic  party  strong  in  the  interests  of  Athens.  Then 
followed  a  succession  of  the  most  bloody  revolutions 
and  counter-revolutions.  The  aristocrats  had  recourse 

*  See  p.  22. 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 


99 


to  the  “  gospel  of  the  dagger ;  ”  and  having  got  rid  in 
this  fashion  of  their  leading  opponents,  maintained 
themselves  for  a  while  in  power.  The  arrival  of 
envoys  from  Corinth  encouraged  the  commons  to  rise 
upon  their  new  masters  ]  slaves  were  armed  and  pro¬ 
mised  liberty  by  both  parties ;  street-fighting  went  on 
from  day  to  day,  with  all  the  bitter  ferocity  which 
marks  the  struggles  of  men  of  the  same  blood  when 
divided  into  hostile  factions,  the  women  of  the  pro¬ 
letariat  taking  their  share  in  the  fight,  and  hurling 
tiles  from  the  houses  on  the  heads  of  the  aristocrats 
below.  These  latter,  to  cut  off  the  approach  to  the 
arsenal  which  they  held,  set  the  town  on  fire.  Fleets 
arrived  both  from  Athens  and  the  Peloponnese,  to 
watch  the  turn  of  events,  and  take  such  measures  as 
they  might  in  support  of  their  own  partisans  amongst 
the  Corcyrscans.  But  the  Athenians  were  in  too  small 
force  to  do  more  than  save  the  Corcyraean  fleet  from 
utter  destruction  in  a  fight  which  ensued  against  an  over¬ 
whelming  Peloponnesian  force  which  drove  them  back 
into  their  harbour.  But  when  a  new  admiral  was  sent 
out  from  Athens,  the  confederates — not  daring  to  meet 
the  naval  strength  of  Athens  upon  anything  like  equal 
terms — sailed  off  towards  home,  leaving  their  un- 
happy  friends  of  the  aristocratical  party  to  the  mercy 
of  their  political  enemies.  Then,  while  the  Athenian 
admiral  Eurymedon  coldly  looked  on  from  the  har¬ 
bour,  for  seven  days  a  reign  of  terror  prevailed  at 
Corey ra.  The  commons,  aided  by  foreign  mercenaries, 
massacred  every  man  whom  they  chose  to  consider  an 
“  aristocrat.” 

boston  college  libuaky 

CHESTNUT  HILL,  MASS. 


100 


THUCYDIDES. 


“  They  denounced  them,”  says  the  historian,  “  as 
conspirators  against  the  people ;  hut  many  lost  their 
lives  owing  to  some  private  grudge,  and  others  because 
money  was  owed  them  by  their  captors.  And  death 
was  inflicted  in  all  varieties  of  form;  and  no  one 
horrible  detail  was  omitted  of  all  that  is  wont  to 
happen  in  such  a  state  of  things, — and  even  more  than 
this,  for  father  killed  son,  and  men  were  dragged  from 
sanctuaries,  or  murdered  in  them :  some  even  were 
walled  up  in  the  temple  of  Bacchus,  and  died  there, 
So  savage  had  the  feud  become.” — (III.  81.) 

It  has  been  said  with  some  truth  of  this  history  in 
general  that  its  tone  is  cold  and  cynical — that,  as  a  rule, 
the  historian  seems  to  occupy  the  position  of  a  looker 
on  at  the  deadly  strife  that  is  rending  the  very  heart 
of  Greece,  studying  and  describing  its  features  some¬ 
thing  after  the  fashion  in  which  a  modern  lecturer  in 
anatomy  is  supposed  to  watch  the  struggles  of  some 
animal  on  whom  he  is  making  an  experiment, — inter¬ 
ested  only  in  the  demonstrations  of  his  science,  and 
insensible  to,  or  careless  of,  the  sufierings  of  its  victims. 
It  may  be  that  to  such  an  impassive  and  philosophical 
spirit  we  owe  much  of  the  admitted  truthfulness  of 
the  narrative.  But  when  Thucydides  comes  to  record 
these  days  of  terror  at  Corcyra,  he  checks  the  steady 
current  of  his  narrative  to  draw  a  picture  of  the  times 
which  becomes  all  the  more  impressive  because  it  comes 
from  the  hand  of  a  keen  observer  who  was  not  carried 
away  by  any  sentimental  enthusiasm,  or  tempted  to 
write  for  sensational  effect.  In  the  remarkable  chapters 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 


101 


■which  follow,  and  to  which  any  translation  can  do  hut 
scant  justice,  though  he  has  Corcyra  and  its  factions 
before  him  as  his  immediate  subject  and  example,  it 
is  plain  that  he  speaks  of  a  phase  of  national  character 
which  was  fast  being  developed  throughout  all  Greece 
by  this  civil  war — for  such,  in  many  of  its  most  de¬ 
plorable  features,  was  this  struggle  between  Hellenic 
states  which  claimed  a  common  origin,  spoke  a  com¬ 
mon  language,  and  appealed  to  a  common  religion. 
The  factions  at  Corcyra,  which  furnish  the  text  of 
these  chapters,  have  been  not  inaptly  compared  to 
the  revolutionary  “  Clubs  ”  of  Paris  ;  but  this  great 
difference  must  be  borne  in  mind,  that  they  were  not 
peculiar  to  the  democratic  party. 

“  The  states  thus  torn  by  faction  displayed  beyond 
all  precedent  a  novelty  of  invention  both  in  elaborat¬ 
ing  plots  and  in  monstrous  acts  of  vengeance.  And 
men  changed  at  will  the  ordinary  meaning  of  words, 
to  suit  their  actions.  Por  unscrupulous  daring  was 
termed  brave  and  good  comradeship ;  a  prudent  hesita¬ 
tion  was  but  specious  cowardice ;  a  general  moderation 
was  a  general  uselessness.  A  mad  impetuosity  was 
the  proof  of  a  manly  spirit ;  caution  in  any  enterprise 
was  a  sign  of  drawing  back.  The  man  who  urged  to 
cruelty  was  a  trusty  citizen  ;  the  man  who  would  dis¬ 
suade  from  it  became  himself  suspeoted.  He  who 
plotted  and  succeeded  was  clever;  he  who  suspected 
plots  was  cleverer  still :  while  he  who  would  have  so 
ordered  matters  as  that  no  plot  should  be  necessary, 
was  charged  with  breaking  up  his  party,  and  being 


102 


THUCYDIDES. 


afraid  of  his  opponents.  In  short,  the  man  who  could 
forestall  others  in  the  commission  of  a  crime,  and  he 
who  incited  to  crime  another  who  had  never  thought  of 
it,  were  alike  commended.  Moreover,  the  ties  of  blood 
were  not  so  close  as  the  ties  of  party,  because  this  latter 
bond  found  men  readier  for  the  most  unscrupulous 
action.  Tor  such  associations  are  formed  not  under 
the  protection  of  ordinary  laws,  but  in  defiance  of  all 
established  law,  in  the  interests  of  selfish  ambition : 
and  fidelity  between  their  members  rests  not  on  any 
sacred  principle,  but  on  the  fact  of  having  been  accom¬ 
plices  in  crime.  Any  fair  proposal  from  an  adversary 
was  received  with  a  cautious  eye  to  his  possible  future 
action,  not  in  any  generous  spirit.*  Eevenge  upon 
an  enemy  was  more  highly  valued  than  the  having  re¬ 
ceived  no  injury  to  avenge.  And  if  oaths  were  em¬ 
ployed  at  any  time  to  ratify  a  convention,  they  were 
taken  by  either  party  only  because  there  was  no  alterna¬ 
tive  at  the  moment,  and  held  good  just  so  long  as  that 
party  gained  no  new  strength ;  but  as  soon  as  a  chance 
offered,  whichever  had  the  boldness  first  to  seize  it,  if 
he  could  catch  the  other  unprepared,  wreaked  his 
vengeance  on  him  with  more  relish,  on  account  of  the 
pledge  between  them,  than  if  it  had  been  after  fair 
warning ;  and  congratulated  himself  not  only  on  the 
safe  opportunity  he  had  found  for  an  attack,  but 

*  Arnold,  in  a  note  on  this  passage,  appositely  quotes  a 
modern  illustration  :  “  ‘Ne  vous  fiez-vous  pas  k  la  parole  du 
roi  V  lui  disait  M.  de  Lionne  dans  une  conference.  ‘  J’ignore  ce 
queveut  leroi,’  dit  Van  Brunnig  ;  ‘je  considkre  ce  qu’il  pent."’ 
— Voltaire,  Sikcle  de  Louis  XLV.,  ch.  9. 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 


103 


on  the  credit  he  should  gain  for  cleverness  besides, 
in  having  so  cunningly  overreached  him.  ...  So 
no  party  recognised  any  religious  obligation,  but  those 
who  succeeded  in  effecting  some  odious  purpose  under 
fair  pretences  were  held  in  all  the  higher  esteem. 
They  who  stood  neutral  became  the  victims  of  both 
parties — either  because  they  would  not  join  them,  or 
out  of  jealousy  that  they  should  so  escape.  Thus, 
in  consequence  of  these  party  factions,  every  species 
of  baseness  began  to  obtain  throughout  Greece,  and 
simplicity,  which  goes  most  commonly  with  a  noble 
nature,  was  ridiculed,  and  disappeared ;  and  the  general 
habit  was  for  men  to  stand  on  their  guard  against  each 
other  in  a  mutual  distrust.  Tor  in  settling  a  quarrel 
no  man’s  word  could  be  trusted,  and  no  oath  was  held 
in  awe.”— (III.  82,  83.) 

% 

The  chapter  which  follows,  and  in  which  the  state  of 
morals  induced  by  such  revolutions  as  that  in  Corcyra 
is  still  further  discussed,  has  given  rise  to  a  curious 
and  interesting  question.  The  old  commentators  de¬ 
tected  peculiarities  in  its  style  and  expressions  which 
satisfied  them  of  its  not  being  the  work  of  Thucydides 
himself,  but  only  a  clever  imitation.  Their  opinion  is 
endorsed  by  modern  scholars :  Arnold  even  calls  it 
“  a  caricature  of  his  style  and  manner.”  It  seems  pro¬ 
bable  that  it  was  inserted  by  a  Christian  student  of 
Thucydides,  of  whom  there  were  very  many  at  Con¬ 
stantinople  between  the  fourth  and  seventh  centuries. 

It  may  be  convenient  once  more  to  break  through 
the  historian’s  arrangement  into  years,  to  get  a  clear 


104 


THUCYDIDES. 


view  of  the  end.  The  aristocrats  of  Corcyra  were  not 
yet  finally  disposed  of.  Some  five  hundred  of  them 
escaped,  and  with  some  hired  mercenaries  fortified 
themselves  on  a  hill  in  the  island  called  Iston^.  Thence 
they  commanded  the  country  round,  cut  off  supplies 
from  the  town,  and  otherwise  harassed  their  enemies 
considerably.  They  asked  support  in  vain  from 
the  Corinthians,  who  had  sent  them  on  their  for¬ 
lorn  hope  of  regaining  the  island,  and  from  the  rest 
of  the  Peloponnesians  whose  cause  they  were  serving ; 
but  they  maintained  themselves  there  for  nearly  two 
years,  when  the  place  was  stormed  by  an  Athenian 
force,  Avho  were  landed  on  the  island  to  relieve  their 
friends  in  the  town  from  this  continual  state  of  local 
warfare.  The  little  garrison  of  Iston^  retired  still 
higher  up  the  mountain,  but  were  at  last  obliged  to 
surrender  at  discretion,  agreeing  “  to  abide  the  judg¬ 
ment  of  the  people  of  Athens.”  Such  terms  did  not 
meet  the  views  of  their  relentless  enemies  at  home. 
Emissaries  from  the  democrats  enticed  some  of  the 
prisoners  secretly  to  break  their  parole,  and  to  make  an 
attempt  to  escape ;  told  them  that  the  Athenian  generals 
meant  to  give  them  up  to  the  mob  ;  and  offered  them 
a  vessel  to  escape  in.  They  fell  into  the  snare ;  were  of 
course  taken  and  brought  back :  the  terms  of  capitu¬ 
lation  were  declared  to  have  been  violated,  and  the 
Athenian  commanders  gave  them  up  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  their  countrymen.  Thucydides  tells  us  what 
followed  : — 


“  When  the  Corcyraeans  got  them  into  their  hands, 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 


-  105 


they  shut  them  up  in  a  large  building  ;  and  afterwards 
bringing  them  out  by  twenty  at  a  time  made  them  pass, 
fettered  together,  through  two  rows  of  armed  .  soldiers 
ranged  on  either  side,  while  they  were  struck  and 
stabbed  by  those  in  the  ranks,  wherever  any  man  espied 
a  personal  enemy ;  and  men  walked  by  the  side  carry¬ 
ing  whips,  with  which  they  quickened  the  pace  of  any 
who  seemed  to  move  too  slowly.  As  many  as  sixty 
they  brought  out  and  massacred  in  this  fashion,  with¬ 
out  its  coming  to  the  knowledge  of  the  others  inside 
(for  these  fancied  they  were  only  removing  them  to 
some  other  quarter).  But  when  they  discovered  the  fact, 
from  some  one  telling  them,  then  they  called  aloud  on 
the  Athenians,  and  begged  that  they  would  slay  them, 
if  they  willed  it  so  to  be.  And  they  would  not  come 
out  of  the  building  any  more,  and  said  they  would 
allow  none  to  enter  it  so  long  as  they  could  strike  a 
blow.  The  Corcyraeans  had  no  mind  themselves  to  forc(3 
the  doors,  but  climbed  on  the  roof  of  the  place,  pulled 
off  the  tiling,  and  hurled  tiles  and  shot  arrows  down 
on  those  within.  These  protected  themselves  as  well 
as  they  could,  and  at  the  same  time  the  majority  began 
to  despatch  themselves,  by  thrusting  into  their  throats 
the  arrows  which  their  enemies  had  discharged,  or 
hanging  themselves  with  the  cordage  of  some  beds 
which  happened  to  be  inside,  or  cutting  strips  from 
tlieir  clothes  for  the  purpose.  So,  through  the  greater 
part  of  the  night  (for  the  night  came  on  during  this 
tragedy),  they  were  making  away  with  themselves  in 
one  fashion  or  other,  or  being  shot  down  by  the  men  on 
the  roof.  When  it  was  day,  the  Corcyraeans  threw  the 


lOG 


THUCYDIDES. 


bodies,  one  upon  the  other,  on  drays,  and  carried  them 
outside  the  town.  All  the  women  taken  in  the  fort 
were  sold  for  slaves.  In  such  fashion  were  the  Corcy- 
raeans  from  the  mountain  slaughtered  by  the  popu¬ 
lace,  and  the  feud  which  had  lasted  so  long  was  thus 
brought  to  a  termination — for  of  one  of  the  two  parties 
there  was  scarcely  a  remnant  left  worth  reckoning.” — 
(IV.  47,  48.) 

Eurymedon — the  same  Athenian  admiral  who  had 
lain  quiet  with  his  fleet  in  the  harbour  while  a  similar 
scene  was  enacted  two  years  before — again  looked  on 
passively  from  his  ships  until  his  savage  allies  had 
glutted  their  revenge,  and  then  moved  off  on  his  way 
to  Sicily. 

It  is  somewhat  startling  to  turn  from  the  calm  and 
dispassionate  account  which  Thucydides  gives  of  the 
horrors  which  marked  the  conduct  of  both  parties  in 
these  deadly  struggles  for  power,  to  the  remarks  which 
Mr  Grote  has  made  upon  them  in  what  he  calls  “  a 
discriminative  criticism.”  Everything  which  falls  from 
such  an  authority  is  weighty,  and  must  be  received 
with  respect.  But  when  we  find  that  he  can  see  little 
in  these  Corcyrsean  horrors  but  “  the  work  of  a  selfish 
oligarchical  party,  playing  the  game  of  a  foreign  en¬ 
emy — aiming  to  subvert  the  existing  democracy  and 
acquire  power  for  themselves,  and  ready  to  employ 
any  measure  of  violence  for  the  attainment  of  these 
objects” — ^when  he  speaks  of  the  democratic  faction 
as  being  “thrown  upon  the  defensive,”  and  says  that 
“their  conduct  as  victors  is  only  such  as  we  might 


THE  TERROR  AT  CORCYRA. 


107 


expect  in  siicli  maddening  circumstances,” — we  feel 
that  we  are  not  listening  to  the  historian  hut  to  the 
politician.  It  is  fair  at  least  to  the  ordinary  reader 
to  warn  him  that  such  a  judgment  cannot  justly  be 
gathered  from  the  pages  of  'Thucydides.  He  has 
set  before  us  clearly  the  bitter  fruits  of  political 
faction  carried  to  extremes  by  a  fierce  and  crafty 
people ;  the  recklessness  of  human  life,  the  revenge, 
the  cruelty,  which  marked  the  age,  and  which  we 
know  was  not  confined,  as  Thucydides  would  seem 
almost  disposed  to  think,  to  Greece  and  its  neigh 
bourhood,  under  the  pressure  of  intestine  war.  But 
he  nowhere  gives  us  reason  to  suppose  that  the  guilt 
could  be  laid  exclusively  or  mainly  to  the  charge  of 
either  party  in  the  struggle, — noble  or  plebeian,  demo¬ 
crat  or  aristocrat,  islander  or  Athenian. 


CHAPTER  IX. 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 

These  sixth  and  seventh  years  of  the  war  bring  into 
the  foreground  one  of  the  Athenian  “  generals  at  sea  ” 
(for  this  old  English  appellation  perhaps  best  serves  to 
express  the  real  position  of  a  naval  commander  of  the 
Greeks)  who  is  to  play  a  considerable  part  in  future 
operations  both  by  sea  and  land.  Demosthenes  first 
distinguished  himself  in  the  summer  of  B.c.  426,  by 
an  attempt  at  the  reduction  of  some  of  the  AEtolian 
tribes,  in  the  hope  of  making  his  way  thence  by  land 
into  Boeotia,  and  eventually  breaking  up  altogether 
the  Lacedaemonian  interest  in  Northern  Greece.  But 
his  attempt  was  very  unfortunate :  he  was  weak  in 
archers  and  light  troops  generally,  and  his  regular 
infantry  could  make  no  head  against  the  harassing 
attacks  of  the  swarms  of  mountaineers.  Their  guide 
was  killed,  and  they  lost  their  way.  The  main  body 
found  itself  surrounded  in  a  forest,  which  was  set  on 
fire  by  the  enemy ;  and  besides  great  loss  amofig  the 
auxiliaries,  half  the  Athenian  force  fell  there,  together 
with  the  other  general.  Erodes — “  the  most  valuable 
lives,”  says  Thucydides,  “  that  were  lost  in  all  this 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 


109 


war.”  So  much  did  Demosthenes  blame  himself  for 
the  disaster,  that  though  his  ships  carried  the  sur¬ 
vivors  of  the  expedition  home  to  Athens,  he  preferred 
himseK  to  find  some  employment  at  the  foreign  station 
of  Naupactus,  “  fearing  to  face  the  Athenians  after  all 
that  had  happened.” 

He  retrieved  his  lost  credit  by  degrees.  Eirst,  he 
succeeded  in  saving  Haupactus  itself  from  projected 
attack  by  throwing  into  it  reinforcements  obtained  by 
his  influence  with  the  neighbouring  tribes.  He  was 
elected  commander -in -chief  of  the  native  levies  of 
Acarnanians,  who  had  an  old  grudge  to  work  out 
against  their  neighbours  the  Ambraciots,  who  were  in 
the  opposite  interest,  and  defeated  these  latter  in  two 
important  battles,  from  one  of  which  such  heaps  of 
spoil  were  carried  off  that  three  hundred  complete 
suits  of  armour  fell  to  the  share  of  Demosthenes 
alone. 

He  had  no  fear  now  of  the  verdict  of  his  country¬ 
men.  When  a  fleet  was  under  orders  next  year  for 
Corcyra  (as  we  have  seen),  and  thence  for  Sicily, 
Demosthenes,  though  we  are  expressly  told  that  he 
was  living  quietly  as  a  private  citizen  since  his  return, 
had  influence  enough  to  obtain  leave  to  accompany  it, 
with  extraordinary  powers.  He  was  to  make  such  use 
of  it  as  he  saw  occasion  on  the  coasts  of  the  peninsula. 
Ho  wonder  that  such  an  anomalous  authority  was  not 
cordially  recognised  by  the  officers  in  actual  command. 
He  had  fixed  his  heart  upon  an  uninhabited  bluff  on 
the  south-west  coast,  some  forty-five  miles  from  Sparta, 
in  the  old  Messenia,  called  Pylos,  overhanging  the 


110 


THUCYDIDES. 


harbour  well  known  in  the  history  of  modern  warfare 
as  Navarino.  This  point  he  had  a  desire  to  fortify ; 
and  there — within  their  ancestral  territory — he  had 
the  design  of  planting  some  of  his  friends,  the  de¬ 
scendants  of  Messenian  exiles  in  ISTaupactus,  to  he  a 
permanent  menace  and  annoyance  to  their  hereditary 
enemies  of  Sparta.  The  actual  commanders,  Eury- 
medon  and  Sophocles,  protested  against  such  delay 
as  tending  to  defeat  the  great  objects  of  the  expedi¬ 
tion,  and  against  the  project  itself  as  a  wild  one.  But 
it  so  happened  that  a  storm  drove  them  into  that  very 
harbour;  and  now  Demosthenes  again  put  forward 
his  idea,  and  again  in  vain.  “  There  were  plenty  of 
unoccupied  headlands  on  the  peninsula,”  said  the 
commanders,  “if  he  wanted  to  waste  the  public 
money  in  building  forts  upon  them.”  But  Demos¬ 
thenes,  who  evidently  had  the  art  of  making  him¬ 
self  popular,  abroad  or  at  home,  persuaded  the  infe¬ 
rior  officers  and  the  men,  who  had  nothing  to  do 
while  detained  in  harbour,  to  begin  the  fortification 
by  way  of  amusement.  Very  soon,  in  a  rough 
way,  by  taking  advantage  of  the  natural  ruggedness 
of  the  place,  a  fort  was  completed ;  and  there  Demos¬ 
thenes,  at  his  own  request,  was  left  with  a  guard 
of  five  ships,  while  the  rest  proceeded  on  their  voyage. 
His  little  garrison  was  soon  strengthened  by  the  ar¬ 
rival  of  two  Messenian  galleys  with  a  few  regular 
troops. 

The  Lacedaemonians  heard  of  the  occupation,  and 
were  at  first  inclined  to  treat  the  affair  with  ridicide, 
as  the  Athenian  adinhals  had  done.  But  Agis,  the 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON 


111 


Spartan  king,  took  a  more  serious  view  of  the  matter. 
He  was  away  in  Attica,  in  command  of  the  confederate 
force,  which  was  engaged,  now  for  the  fifth  season, 
in  burning  and  destroying  the  crops  of  the  unhappy 
farmers  of  Attica.  The  invaders  themselves  were  suffer¬ 
ing  there  in  some  degree ;  the  corn  was  not  so  forward 
as  usual,  for  the  spring  had  been  cold,  and  they  had 
hard  work  to  maintain  themselves.  The  king  evac¬ 
uated  the  country  after  the  comparatively  short  stay 
of  fifteen  days,  and  hurried  back  to  meet  the  new 
emergency.  The  fleet  was  recalled  from  Corcyra; 
and  as  soon  as  possible  an  attack  was  made  in  strong 
force  by  land  and  sea  upon  Demosthenes’s  new  strong¬ 
hold.  He  had  received  sufficient  warning,  however, 
to  send  off  for  help  to  the  Athenian  admirals,  and 
meanwhile  made  the  best  dispositions  he  could. 

Across  and  in  front  of  the  harbour,  forming  its 
natural  protection,  lay  the  little  island  of  Sphakteria 
(Sphagia).  This  was  at  once  occupied  by  the  Spar¬ 
tans,  whde  they  prepared  to  close  the  two  narrow 
entrances  to  the  harbour  on  each  side  of  the  island 
by  galleys  strongly  lashed  together  with  their  beaks 
outwards,  so  as  to  keep  off  the  expected  Athenian 
fleet,  and  block  up  the  garrison  of  Pylos.*  Then  they 
made  their  attack  from  within.  Demosthenes  drew 
up  his  little  force  at  the  landing-place — narrow  and 

*  The  present  geography  of  ISTavariuo  and  Sphagia  can  hardly 
be  reconciled  with  this  description.  “  There  is  no  alternative,” 
says  Grote,  “  except  to  suppose  that  a  great  alteration  has 
taken  place  in  the  two  passages  which  se{)arate  Sphagia  from 
the  mainland,  during  the  interval  of  2400  years.” 


112 


THUCYDIDES. 


difificiilt — and  fought  at  their  head.  The  enemy  at¬ 
tacked  in  divisions,  for  only  a  few  galleys  could  take 
the  shore  at  the  same  time ;  hut  attempt  after  attempt 
was  repulsed.  In  vain  did  the  historian’s  favourite 
hero,  Brasidas — foremost  here  as  always — do  all  that 
a  hero  could. 

“Most  conspicuous  of  all  was  Brasidas.  He  was  in' 
command  of  a  galley;  and  when  he  saw  the  other 
captains  and  their  steersmen  hesitating  because  the 
landing  was  difficult,  and  cautious  of  wrecking  their 
vessels,  even  where  it  did  seem  possible  to  take  the 
shore,  he  shouted  aloud  that  ‘  it  did  not  become  them 
to  be  sparing  of  their  timbers  where  the  enemy  had 
built  a  stone  wall,’  and  hade  them  even  stave  their 
galleys  in,  if  need  were,  and  force  a  landing.  And 
he  hade  the  allies  not  grudge  to  sacrifice  their  ships 
for  the  Lacedaemonians,  in  this  hoiu*  of  need,  in 
return  for  their  many  obligations;  but  to  run  them 
ashore,  and  land  at  all  hazards,  and  make  themselves 
masters  of  the  place  and  the  garrison.  Thus  did  he 
upbraid  the  others ;  and  so,  having  forced  his  own 
helmsman  to  run  his  galley  ashore,  stepped  on  the 
gangway,  and,  as  he  was  in  the  act  of  landing,  was 
cut  down  by  the  Athenians,  and  fell  apparently  life¬ 
less,  covered  with  wounds.  His  shield  slipped  from 
his  arm  and  fell  into  the  sea ;  and  when  it  was  after¬ 
wards  cast  ashore,  the  Athenians  picked  it  up,  and 
used  it  in  forming  the  trophy  which  they  set  up  after 
repulsing  the  attack.  Eager  as  the  rest  were  to  land, 
they  could  not  do  it ;  so  difficult  was  the  place,  and  so 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 


113 


firmly  did  the  Athenians  stand  their  ground  and  never 
give  back.”— (lY.  11,  12.) 

Thucydides  remarks  on  the  reversal  of  parts  on  this 
occasion, — the  Athenians,  whose  pride  was  in  their 
naval  superiority,  fighting  so  well  on  land,  while  the 
Lacedaemonians  were  now  the  attacking  party  by  sea. 
These  resolved,  however,  that  their  next  attempt  should 
be  from  the  land  side.  But  now  the  Athenian  fleet  re¬ 
turned  to  the  rescue  of  the  garrison,  and  all  at  once 
matters  were  entirely  changed.  They  sailed  into  the 
harbour  before  the  enemy  had  carried  out  their  purpose 
of  blockading  the  entrances, '  captured  and  destroyed 
some  portion  of  their  fleet,  became  themselves  masters 
of  the  harbour,  and  so  cut  off  the  Lacedaemonian  de¬ 
tachment  who  had  been  landed  on  the  island  from 
all  intercourse  with  their  friends  on  the  mainland. 
The  blockading  party  had  in  their  turn  become  the 
blockaded. 

The  liacedaemonians  were  in  consternation.  Their 
men  on  the  island  seemed  to  have  only  the  choice 
between  starvation  and  surrender.  The  Ephors — the 
high  council  of  State,  superior  in  some  respects  even 
to  the  kings — came  in  person  to  Pylos  to  advise.  They 
obtained  an  armistice,  and  sent  ambassadors  to  Athens 
to  try  to  negotiate  a  peace.  Before  even  the  armistice 
was  granted,  they  had  to  put  their  entire  naval  force 
of  sixty  galleys  into  the  hands  of  the  Athenians  as  a 
guarantee  of  good  faith,  that  so  they  might  be  allowed 
to  supply  their  men  in  Sphakteria  with  daily  rations 

A.C.S.S.  vol.  vl  H 


114 


THVGYBIBkS. 


SO  long  as  the  armistice  should  last,  until  the  return  of 
their  ambassadors  from  Athens. 

There  is  a  proud  hmnility  in  the  language  in  which 
Thucydides  has  embodied  the  overtures  made  by  the 
envoys  of  Lacedaemon.  They  appeal  to  the  common 
experience  of  all  men  as  to  the  fickleness  of  fortune. 
“  We,  who  stand  first  in  reputation  of  aU  Greeks,  are 
come  here  to  you, — we  who  aforetime  thought  our¬ 
selves  rather  in  a  position  to  bestow  what  we  now 
come  to  ask  :  simply  because  we  have  failed  in  cal¬ 
culations  which  would  have  been  justified  under  ordi¬ 
nary  circumstances.”  Let  them  beware,  continued  the 
speaker,  of  dreaming  that  fortune  would  always 
favour  one  side,  or  that  war  would  always  take  the 
course  which  the  belligerents  expected  or  desired. 
Athens  had  now  an  excellent  opportunity  of  showing 
moderation  in  her  hour  of  triumph,  and  of  leaving  to 
posterity  a  lasting  reputation  for  true  wisdom  as  well 
as  power.  Bitter  as  their  enmity  had  been,  generosity 
might  make  them  friends, — the  driving  men  to  ex¬ 
tremities  never  would.  The  speaker  adds  a  word,  as 
well  he  might,  on  behalf  of  the  unfortunate  smaller 
states  of  each  confederacy,  “who  were  now  fighting 
without  clearly  knowing  which  party  was  the  ag¬ 
gressor.”  But  he  belies  this  unusual  show  of  con¬ 
sideration  for  weaker  powers  by  the  selfish  policy 
more  than  hinted  at  in  his  conclusion  —  that  “if 
Athens  and  Lacedaemon  were  hut  agreed,  they  might 
he  sure  that  the  rest  of  Greece  would  know  its  own 
weakness  too  well  not  to  show  them  the  greatest 
deference.” 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 


115 


The  Athenian  Assembly  was  too  triumphant  to  be 
moderate.  “  They  thought,”  says  their  historian, 
“  that  they  could  now  have  peace  whenever  they 
chose,  and  they  were  greedy  after  further  advantage.” 
Toremost  of  those  who  expressed  this  feeling  loudly 
was  Cleon,  still  as  powerful  as  ever  with  the  multitude. 
He  persuaded  them  to  insist  on  the  restoration  of  the 
forts  of  the  JMegarians,  Pegse  and  Nissea — dear  to  the 
hearts  of  the  Athenian  commons  as  Calais  was  to  the 
English  queen — with  certain  other  acquisitions  which 
they  had  been  compelled  to  give  up  by  the  terms  of 
that  “  Tliirty  Years’  Peace  ”  which  had  so  lately  been 
broken.  The  Lacedsemonians  were  not  as  yet  suffi¬ 
ciently  humbled  to  accept  such  conditions,  and  their 
envoys  went  back  to  Pylos. 

The  Athenians  still  retained  possession  of  the 
enemy’s  fleet,  regardless  of  all  protest,  on  the  real  or 
pretended  ground  of  some  violation  of  the  terms  of  ar¬ 
mistice;  and  their  own  gaUeys  cruised  round  Sphakteria 
day  and  night,  giving  no  chance  of  relief  or  escape  to 
the  unfortunate  prisoners  there.  But  this  constant 
blockade  grew  wearisome ;  the  Athenians  suffered  from 
scarcity  of  water;  in  spite  of  all  precautions,  slaves 
were  found  who  swam  over  from  the  mainland  with 
scanty  supplies  of  corn  to  the  men  on  the  island,  or 
crossed  from  various  points  in  small  boats  on  stormy 
nights,  tempted  by  large  rewards ;  and  Athens  grew 
impatient.  “Why  was  not  a  landing  effected,  and  the 
men  made  prisoners  at  once  %  ” 

Then  followed  a  curious  episode  in  the  war — a  half- 
,  ludicrous  triumph  for  the  favourite  of  the  Athenian 


116 


THUCYDIDES. 


commons,  and  an  endless  subject  of  jest  for  tlie  politi¬ 
cal  satirists  of  tlie  day.  Cleon  said,  in  one  of  bis 
harangues,  that  “  if  their  generals  were  but  men,  they 
would  run  their  vessels  in,  and  capture  the  people 
on  the  island ;  and  if  he  were  in  command,  he  would 
do  it.” 

“  He  aimed  his  words  at  Nicias,  son  of  N’iceratus, 
who  was  then  general,  and  whom  he  hated,”  says  the 
historian ;  for  bTicias  was  the  very  opposite  of  Cleon, 
the  representative  of  all  that  was  moderate  and  respect¬ 
able.  Nicias  at  once  bade  him — so  far  as  he  was  con¬ 
cerned — take  what  force  he  chose  with  him,  and  at¬ 
tempt  it.  How  far  either  was  in  earnest  at  the  outset 
seems  doubtful.  Cleon  would  have  drawn  back  from 
his  first  challenge ;  but  the  more  he  seemed  to  try  to 
escape  from  the  position,  the  more  strongly  did  both 
his  supporters  and  his  enemies  insist  on  his  carrying 
it  out.  Then  he  changed  his  mood  :  give  him  merely 
a  body  of  auxiliaries — he  would  not  ask  to  risk  an 
Athenian’s  life  in  the  service  —  and  within  twenty 
days  he  would  bring  these  Spartans  prisoners  to 
Athens,  or  die  in  the  attempt.  ‘‘There  was  a  good 
deal  of  merriment  among  the  Athenians,”  says  Thucy¬ 
dides,  “  at  his  boastful  talk ;  all  the  moderate  party, 
however,  were  delighted,  calcidating  that  one  of  two 
-gopd ’things  must  be  the  result — they  would  either  get 
rid^pf  Cleon  (which  was  what  they  rather  hoped  and 
‘  "  'jex;^ctedW^^  if  they  were  disappointed  in  that  opinion, 
..v';-: '  -they '^ould'^t  the  Lacedaemonians  into  their  hands.” 
It  'is  not:  difficult  to  understand  that  such  a  challenge 

'*•»*'*  *  ♦  *  ■  *  ••’V  * 

.  from  Clebn*.  would  be  received  by  the  Athenian  mob 


DEMOSTJIEN^ES  AND  CLEON. 


117 


with  a  keen  appreciation  of  the  joke  against  the 
“moderates,”  and  a  half-humorous  and  half-serious 
encouragement  to  carry  it  out.  But  it  is  seldom  that  a 
practical  jest  is  carried  out  on  so  grand  a  scale,  or  at 
such  risk  of  national  honour. 

Cleon  set  out  for  Pylos ;  and,  probably  to  the  sur¬ 
prise  of  friends  and  foes  alike,  made  good  his  words. 
He  had  asked  to  have  Demosthenes  associated  with  him 
in  the  command,  because  he  was  aware,  the  historian 
thinks,  that  he  was  already  meditating  a  descent  upon 
the  island.  A  strong  force  of  heavy-armed  infantry 
were  landed  before  daybreak  in  two  divisions,  at  two 
separate  points,  who  cut  to  pieces  the  enemy’s  out¬ 
post;  and  at  dawn  the  light  troops  followed  them, 
took  advantage  of  all  rising  ground,  and  thence 
showered  arrows  and  javelins  on  the  enemy.  The 
whole  force  thrown  upon  the  island  must  have  been 
near  10,000  men.  Por  a  while  the  Lacedaemonians 
maintained  themselves  in  an  old  rude  fortification  at 
one  end  of  the  island,  though  their  men  were  falling 
fast,  and  they  were  all  weak  from  long  privation ;  but 
at  last  they  were  taken  in  rear,  their  commander  was 
killed,  and  his  lieutenant  mortally  wounded ;  and  the 
survivors  lowered  their  shields  and  bowed  their  heads 
towards  their  assailants  in  token  of  submission.  Within 
the  twenty  days,  Cleon  brought  home  his  prisoners  to 


Athens — two  hundred  and  ninety-two  nij^n;  of 
one  hundred  and  twenty  were  citizens .  of  /S-p^^ta. 
Hearly  one-third  of  the  detachment  had  f aU^i 
obstinate  defence.  U’' v.  .  -. 

It  is  perhaps  the  most  remarkable ^^^fsode' in'^the/ 


118 


THUCYDIDES. 


whole  war ;  and  one  does  not  feel  sure  that  the  story, 
well  told  as  it  is,  is  told  quite  fairly  for  Cleon.  All  that 
Thucydides  says  of  his  success  is,  “So  Cleon’s  promise, 
insane  as  it  was,  was  fulfilled.”  He  would  make  it  ap¬ 
pear  that  Cleon  was  a  mere  braggart — that  he  was  driven 
to  carry  out  his  boast  quite  against  his  will — and  that 
he  was  favoured  unexpectedly  by  circumstances ;  and 
that  the  credit  of  the  capture  was  due,  after  all,  to 
Demosthenes  and  not  to  him.  It  is  quite  impossible 
to  discuss,  in  these  brief  pages,  a  question  which  has 
interested  and  divided  great  historical  authorities,  and 
as  to  which  we  have  very  few  facts,  and  very  strong 
assertions ;  but  Mr  Grote’s  defence  of  Cleon  is  at  least 
well  worth  reading.  He  is  clearly  right  on  one  point : 
if  Cleon  was  a  mere  idle  boaster,  and  not  a  competent 
soldier,  it  was  a  gross  breach  of  trust  in  Hicias  to  resign 
his  command  to  him  so  readily.  That  Cleon  was  violent 
and  boastful  may  be  readily  believed,  without  impugn¬ 
ing  his  military  capacity ;  and  at  Athens  every  politi¬ 
cal  leader  was  almost  of  necessity  a  soldier  also,  and 
must  be  ready  to  take  responsibility  upon  himself  in 
the  field  as  well  as  in  the  council.  There  is  undoubt¬ 
edly  an  exceptional  bitterness,  whether  it  be  of  prejudice 
or  of  honest  contempt,  in  Thucydides’s  language  about 
Cleon  ;  and  this  has  led  to  the  belief  that  Cleon  was 
his  personal  enemy,  and  the  chief  agent  in  his  banish¬ 
ment  from  Athens.  Yet  we  have  to  remember,  when 
we  begin  to  suspect  the  historian  of  having  for  a 
moment  forgotten  his  usual  impartiality,  that  his 
narrative  of  the  affair  of  Sphakteria  was  drawn  up 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 


119 


in  tlie  first  instance  for  a  public  who  were  cotempo¬ 
rary  with  the  event  itself;  and  that  the  satirists  of 
the  day — who  are  valuable  witnesses  if  not  always  to 
facts,  yet  to  the  popular  judgment  of  facts — more  than 
endorse  the  historian’s  estimate  of  Cleon’s  exploit. 

This  passage  in  Greek  history  has  a  very  curious 
parallel  in  our  own.  Our  West  India  merchant-ships 
had  long  been  harassed  by  the  Spaniards,  who  made 
Porto  Bello  in  New  Granada  their  chief  station.  Ad¬ 
miral  Hosier  was  sent  with  a  fleet  to  cruise  off  that  coast 
for  the  protection  of  British  trade,  but  with  orders  not 
to  attack  the  place.  During  a  long  inaction  he  lost 
his  best  officers  and  half  his  crews  by  disease,  while  he 
felt  himself  a  laughing-stock  to  the  Spaniards;  and  the 
chagrin  and  mortification  are  said  to  have  finally  broken 
his  heart.  Meanwhile,  in  1739,  Admiral  Vernon,  an 
Opposition  member  of  the  House  of  Commons — who 
seems  to  have  been  not  unlike  Cleon  in  character, 
fierce  and  not  ineloquent  in  debate,  the  delight  of  his 
own  party,”  and  with  a  considerable  share  of  “  blunt 
impudence” — said  that  Porto  Bello  might  easily  be 
taken  :  nay,  that  he  would  undertake  to  do  so  with  six 
ships,  if  he  were  given  the  command.  Sir  Eobert 
Walpole,  wlio  was  then  Minister,  “  hoping  to  appease 
the  popular  clamour,  and  to  get  rid  for  a  time  of  Ver¬ 
non’s  busy  opposition,”  closed  with  the  offer.  Vernon 
went  out,  took  the  place,  razed  its*  fortifications,  and 
returned  to  receive  a  popular  ovation  and  the  formal 
thanks  of  both  Houses.  The  parallel  holds  good  even 
further :  Vernon  failed  afterwards,  when  put  in  com- 


120 


THUCYDIDES. 


niand  on  the  West  India  station,  as  Cleon  did  in 
Thrace.* 

The  surrender  of  a  Lacedaemonian  force,  consist¬ 
ing  in  large  proportion  of  citizens  of  Sparta,  caused  a 
profound  sensation  throughout  the  Greek  communities. 
“  Their  opinion  of  the  Lacedaemonians  had  always 
been  that  neither  for  famine  nor  for  any  other  strait 
would  they  stoop  to  lay  down  their  arms,  hut  that 
they  would  die  with  their  weapons  in  their  hands, 
fighting  to  the  last.”  Some  professed  not  to  believe, 
he  goes  on  to  say,  that  the  men  who  surrendered  were 
of  true  Spartan  blood,  like  those  who  fell.  “One 
inquirer  asked,  by  way  of  insult,  whether  those  who 
had  been  killed  were  all  real  Spartan  gentlemen?” 
and  was  answered  by  one  of  the  prisoners  “that  it 
would  be  a  valuable  arrow  indeed  which  knew  how  to 
pick  out  the  best  men.” 

The  occupation  of  Pylos  was  made  permanent,  by 
planting  there  a  garrison  of  Messenians  from  Haupac- 
tus,  who  were  admirably  fitted,  from  their  knowledge 
of  the  Lacedaemonian  language  and  habits,  to  annoy 
and  harass  the  surrounding  district ;  the  place  would 
serve,  too,  as  an  asylum  to  such  of  the  Lacedaemonian 
slaves  (the  Helots,  consisting  mainly  of  the  descendants 
of  the  conquered  Messenians)  as  might  take  the  op¬ 
portunity  to  desert.  Mcias  succeeded  also  in  occupy- 
mg  another  very  important  station  on  their  enemy’s 

*  This  remarkable  parallel  was  first  noticed  by  a  writer  in  the 
‘Philological  Museum,’ vol.  ii.  p.  704.  The  story  is  perhaps  best 
known  by  Glover’s  (or  Lord  Bath’s)  ballad,  “  Hosier’s  Ghost,” 
which  seems  to  have  been  really  written  as  a  political  squib. 


DEMOSTHENES  AND  CLEON. 


121 


coast — tlie  island  of  Cytliera  (Cerigo) — and  made  this 
the  base  of  his  operations  against  the  maritime  towns. 
He  retorted  upon  the  Lacedaemonians  their  own  strat¬ 
egics  by  a  seven  days’  raid  upon  crops  and  cattle ; 
while  they  on  their  part  were  forced  to  omit  their 
us  ial  invasion  in  the  early  summer  of  the  year  that  fol¬ 
lowed  the  disaster  at  Sphakteria,  because  the  Athenians 
had  given  warning  that  they  would  put  the  prisoners 
who  had  been  taken  there  to  death,  if  the  enemy 
marched  over  their  border.  It  was  probably  at  this 
time  that  the  Lacedaemonians  carried  out  perhaps  the 
most  cruel  and  treacherous  act  of  policy  which  history 
records.  Many  of  these  Helots  had  done  them  faithful 
service  in  the  war ;  but  now,  with  these  new  places  of 
refuge  open  for  them  at  Pylos  and  Cythera,  they  were 
under  strong  temptation  to  throw  off  their  yoke.  Let 
Thucydides  tell  the  story,  though  he  does  it  in  the 
coldest  words,  and  with  no  note  of  reprobation  : — 

“They  made  proclamation  that  they  would  select 
[from  the  Helots]  those  who  could  show  that  they  had 
done  them  the  best  service  in  war,  in  order  to  give 
them  their  freedom ;  applying  a  sort  of  test,  as  think¬ 
ing  that  those  who  had  the  spirit  to  come  forward  first 
to  claim  their  freedom  were  the  very  men  who  were 
most  likely  to  rise  upon  their  masters.  So  they  picked 
out  two  thousand,  who  crowned  themselves  with  gar¬ 
lands  and  made  the  round  of  all  the  temples  as  freed- 
men :  and  soon  afterwards  they  got  rid  of  them  all, 
and  yet  no  man  knew  in  what  fashion  they  were 
severally  made  away  with.” — {IV.  80.) 


122 


THUCYDIDES. 


So  utterly  disheartened  were  the  Lacedjemonian . 
leaders,  that  they  sent  again  to  negotiate  a  peace,  hut 
again  in  vam.  Athens  was  determined  to  push  her 
good  fortune  to  the  uttermost,  and  to  dictate  her  own 
terms;  and  she  thus  lost  an  opportunity  of  terminat¬ 
ing  the  war  with  honour  and  advantage  which  never 
occurred  to  her  under  such  favourable  circumstances 


again. 


CHAPTER  X. 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPHIPOLIS. 

In  the  eighth  year  of  the  war,  there  came  an  appeal  to 
the  Lacedaemonians  from  Thrace.  The  subject-allies 
of  Athens  in  that  quarter  were  always  restless,  and 
only  wanted  some  external  support  to  break  out  into 
open  revolt  against  her  rule.  Perdiccas  of  Macedonia, 
too,  having  a  ^quarrel  of  his  own  on  hand  with  a 
neighbouring  prince,  offered  to  join  the  Chalcidians 
of  Thrace  in  paying  and  maintaining  a  body  of  troops 
from  Lacedaemon,  if  they  could  be  sent;  and  they 
specially  asked  that  Brasidas,  as  knowing  the  country 
and  being  highly  popular,  should  be  sent  out  in  com¬ 
mand.  He  had  by  this  time  recovered  from  his  wounds 
at  Pylos,  and  was  ready  enough  to  go.  But  the  enter¬ 
prise  was  not  much  favoured  by  his  government.  He 
seems  to  have  undertaken  it  very  much  on  his  own 
responsibility.  All  that  he  could  obtain  was  the 
arming  of  700  of  the  Helots — whom,  under  present 
circumstances,  the  authorities  at  Sparta  were  glad 
enough  to  spare — and  leave  to  raise  volunteers  in 
the  country.  With  these — some  1700  men  in  all — 
he  set  out  by  forced  marches  through  Thessaly' 


124 


THUCYDIDES. 


favoured  by  some  of  the  chiefs,  and  escaping  all 
opposition  (though  most  of  the  tribes  were  friendly 
to  the  Athenians),  alike  by  the  rapidity  of  his  move¬ 
ments  and  the  tact  with  which  he  persuaded  them  of 
the  harmless  character  of  his  expedition.  So  he  safely 
reached  Dium,  under  Mount  Olympus,  and  there 
effected  a  junction  with  Perdiccas,  against  whom  the 
Athenians,  hearing  of  this  movement,  had  already 
declared  war.  But  the  objects  of  Perdiccas  and  of 
Brasidas  were  different,  and  their  co-operation  did  not 
last  long. 

His  first  operation  was  against  the  colony  of 
Acanthus,  where  a  party  was  ready  to  receive  him. 
Our  author  says  that  “  for  a  Lacedaemonian,  Brasidas 
was  not  a  bad  speaker.”  He  made  a  speech  on  this 
occasion  which  at  least  showed  tact  and  good  sense. 
He  began  with  the  popular  assertion  thkt  he  was  come 
“  to  liberate  Greece.”  He  expressed  his  surprise  that 
they  were  not  unanimous  in  welcoming  him ;  he  had 
come  a  long  way,  and  at  much  risk,  for  their  sakes;  he 
was  not  there  as  a  partisan  of  the  oligarchical  party;  all 
should  be  guaranteed  their  rights  and  liberties,  if  they 
accepted  the  alliance  of  Sparta.  But  he  could  not 
allow  so  important  a  city  to  damage  the  great  cause  of 
independence  by  its  cowardice  in  not  accepf  ing  such 
an  offer,  or  permit  Acanthus  to  continue  to  contribute 
revenue  to  the  enemy :  if  they  declined  his  overtures, 
he  must,  very  reluctantly,  use  force. 

Either  his  first  or  his  last  arguments  had  the  desired 
effect.  Acanthus  changed  its  allegiance,  and  Brasidas 
occupied  the  town.  Some  of  its  weaker  neighbours 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPHIPOLIS. 


125 


followed  its  example,  and  others  were  reduced  by 
force. 

But  the  great  stronghold  of  Athenian  power  and 
influence  in  those  quarters  was  Amphipolis  —  “  the- 
city  -  looking  -  both  -  ways  ” —  which,  with  its  adjacent 
port  at  Eion,  commanded  the  passage  of  the  river 
Strymon,  and  was  the  key  to  the  commerce  of  the 
interior,  and  the  depot  for  ship-timber  from  the  neigh¬ 
bouring  forests  of  Thrace.  Thucydides  tells  us  that 
the  town  of  his  own  day  was  the  second  attempt 
which  the  Athenians  had  made  to  form  a  settlement 
there;  and  the  importance  attached  to  the  position 
may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that  a  body  of  no  less 
than  10,000  colonists  had  gone  out  from  Athens  to 
occupy  it  in  the  first  instance,  all  of  whom  were  cut 
off  by  the  native  tribes. 

Amphipolis  was  destined  to  be  a  fateful  name  to 
three  of  the  best-known  actors  in  this  war.  It  was 
the  scene  of  our  historian’s  first  campaign,  so  far  as  we 
know,  and  certainly  of  his  last.  He  gives  a  very  brief, 
and  scarcely  a  satisfactory,  account  of  it.  His  personal 
history  and  military  reputation  depend  so  much  upon 
it,  that  it  is  fair,  in  the  first  place,  to  give  his  own  few 
words.  Brasidas  had  hoped  to  take  the  place  by  sur¬ 
prise,  with  the  aid  of  a  jDarty  inside  the  walls  who 
were  prepared  to  betray  it  to  hiim 

“Meanwhile,  the  party  opposed  to  these  tiaitors 
in  conjunction  with  Eucles,  the  commander  who  had 
come  to  them  from  Athens  to  defend  the  place, 
sent  off  to  the  other  officer  who  was  in  command  in 


126 


THUCYDIDES. 


Thrace  and  its  neighbourhood, — Thucydides,  son  of 
Olorus,  who  'wrote  this  history,  and  who  was  then  at 
Thasos,  an  island  about  half  a  day’s  sail  from  Am- 
phipolis, — urging  him  to  come  to  their  relief.  As  soon 
as  he  heard  it,  he  set  sail  at  once  with  seven  ships 
which  happened  to  be  there,  hoping  to  reach  Am- 
phipolis  before  any  capitulation  took  place,  or  in  any 
case  to  save  Eion.  Brasidas  meanwhile,  fearing  the 
arrival  of  this  naval  reinforcement  from  Thasos,  and 
hearing  that  Thucydides  had  a  property  in  the  work¬ 
ing  of  the  gold-mines  in  that  part  of  Thrace,  and  from 
that  circumstance  possessed  great  influence  amongst 
the  inhabitants,  made  every  effort  to  be  beforehand 
with  him,  if  possible,  in  making  himself  master  of  the 
town;  lest,  if  Thucydides  arrived,  the  commons  of 
Amphipolis,  expecting  that  he  would  raise  succours 
for  them  both  by  sea  and  from  Thrace,  and  so  secure 
them,  would  not  surrender.” — (lY.  104.) 

Brasidas  offered  freedom  and  an  independent  govern¬ 
ment  to  all  who  chose  to  remain  at  Amphipolis,  and 
liberty  to  withdraw,  with  all  their  property,  to  those 
who  preferred  to  do  so ;  and  his  terms  were  at  once 
accepted.  The  author  proceeds  : — 

“  So  on  these  terms  they  surrendered  the  city ;  and 
late  that  evening  Thucydides  and  his  galleys  reached 
Eion.  Brasidas  had  just  taken  possession  of  Amphi¬ 
polis,  and  was  within  one  night  of  taking  Eion ;  for 
had  not  the  fleet  come  promptly  to  its  relief,  he  must 
have  had  it  in  the  morning.  Subsequently,  Thucy- 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPIIIPOLIS. 


127 


dides  so  ordered  matters  as  to  secure  Eion,  not  only 
for  the  present,  in  case  Erasidas  should  attack  it,  hut 
for  the  future  as  well;  receiving  there  all  who  chose  to 
come  in  from  the  town  above,  in  accordance  with  the 
terms.  Erasidas  made  a  sudden  descent  hj  the  river 
with  a  considerable  number  of  boats,  on  the  chance  of 
seizing  the  point  of  land  which  reached  out  from  the 
fortifications,  and  of  so  commanding  the  entrance,  and 
made  an  attack  at  the  same  time  by  land,  but  was  re¬ 
pulsed  in  both.”— (lY.  107.) 

It  was  for  his  conduct  on  this  occasion  that  the 
writer  was  either  banished  from  Athens,  or  expatriated 
.  himself  to  avoid  a  public  sentence.  He  has  mentioned 
this  fact  in  as  cold  and  brief  terms  as  those  in  which 
he  describes  the  events  which  led  to  it.  He  only  al¬ 
ludes  to  it  incidentally,  when  speaking  of  the  oppor¬ 
tunities  he  had  of  watching  and  recording  the  issue  of 
the  struggle  at  his  leisure.  “  It  was  my  fate  to  be  an 
exile  from  my  country  for  twenty  years,  after  the  oper¬ 
ations  at  Amphipolis.”*  There  is  no  word  here  of  com¬ 
plaint  or  of  self-excuse;  and  this  reticence  has  been 
noted  as  a  silent  admission  of  culpability.  It  might  be 
observed,  on  the  other  hand,  that  there  was  no  neces¬ 
sity  for  his  thus  placing  on  record,  in  a  work  which 
he  hoped  would  be  to  his  countrymen  “a  heritage  for 
ever,”  the  cause  of  his  exile,  if  he  felt  it  to  have  been 
discreditable  to  himself.  The  question  of  the  degree 
of  blame  to  be  attached  to  Thucydides  for  the  loss  of 
Amphipolis  has  been  keenly  discussed;  and  it  has 


*  V.  26. 


128 


THUCYDIDES. 


been  assumed  tbat  be  was  in  fact  occupied  in  looking 
after  his  own  mining  interests  in  Thasos,  and  that  this 
was  why  the  ships  “  happened  to  he  there,”  when  they 
ought  to  have  been  at  Eion.  But  the  difficulty  of 
forming  a  just  estimate  of  military  operations  even 
when  all  the  facts  are  recently  before  us,  and  the 
mistakes  continually  made  by  civilian  criticism,  arc 
so  notorious,  that  few  sensible  readers  will  be  disposed 
to  sit  in  judgment  upon  a  campaign  which  took  place 
more  than  two  thousand  years  ago,  and  as  to  the  de¬ 
tails  of  which  we  have  really  no  information.  It  is 
asserted  by  one  of  the  biographers  of  the  historian 
that  Cleon  was  instrumental  in  his  banishment,  and 
that  personal  feeling  on  that  account  explains  much  of 
the  exceptional  severity  with  which  Cleon’s  character 
is  handled  in  tliis  history  of  the  war.  It  is  at  least 
very  probable  that  Cleon,  wielding  as  he  did  a  strong 
popular  influence,  did  bring  it  to  bear  against  an  un¬ 
successful  commander  whose  political  views  were  the 
opposite  to  his  own.  But  nearly  all  that  is  certain  in 
the  matter  is  this — that  had  Thucydides  been  more 
successful  as  a  soldier,  we  might  have  seen  nothing  of 
this  history. 

Thucydides  disappears  altogether  from  the  scene, 
after  playing  this  brief  and  unsuccessful  part.  He 
had  to  leave  others  to  work  out  the  fortunes  of  Athens, 
while  they  were  to  owe  to  his  pen  much  of  the  interest 
which  they  retain  to  this  day  for  the  modern  student 
and  reader. 

He  candidly  and  simply  admits  that  the  news  of  the 
loss  of  Amphipolis  was  received  at  Athens  with  “  great 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPUIPOLIS. 


129 


dismay.”  They  saw  in  it  the  prelude  to  a  general  de¬ 
fection  of  their  allies  on  the  Thracian  border.  In  a  great 
measure  it  was  so.  Everywhere  Brasidas  announced 
himself  as  the  liberator  of  those  to  whom  he  appealed. 
Uniting  in  his  own  character  all  the  best  qualities  of  an 
officer,  gentleness  and  moderation  combined  with  the 
most  daring  personal  courage,  he  inspired  confidence  in 
all  with  whom  he  had  to  do ;  and  town  after  town  either 
listened  to  his  proposals,  or  even  sent  secret  messages 
to  invite  him  to  organise  and  support  a  revolution. 
ISTews  had  reached  Thrace,  too,  of  the  disastrous  defeat 
of  the  Athenians  by  the  combined  forces  of  Boeotia  at 
the  battle  of  Delium* — of  which  the  historian  gives 
a  full  account,  but  on  which  we  must  not  linger — and 
they  came  to  the  rash  conclusion  that  this  was  the  begin¬ 
ning  of  the  end.  “  The  extent  of  their  miscalculation  of 
the  power  of  Athens  only  became  evident  to  them  by 
her  subsequent  achievements,”  says  Thucydides,  in  one 
of  his  most  obscure  sentences  ;  “  they  judged  rather 
from  their  own  groundless  wishes,  than  from  any  safe 
calculation.  Eor  when  men  earnestly  desire  a  thing, 
they  are  wont  to  indulge  their  hope  of  it  without  much 
consideration,  and  to  put  aside  what  is  disagreeable  by  a 
process  of  reasoning  which  admits  no  argument  on  the 
other  side.”  As  fast  as  they  could,  the  Athenians  threw 
garrisons  into  the  toAvns  which  still  retained  their 
allegiance ;  while  Brasidas  on  his  part  sent  home  for 
reinforcements.  He  saw  all  the  advantages  of  Amphi- 
polis  as  a  naval  station,  and  would  at  once  have  begun 
to  build  a  fleet  of  war-galleys  in  the  river,  but  was  foiled 


A.c.s.s.  vol.  vi 


*  IV.  90,  &c. 


1 


130 


THUCYDIDES. 


in  his  scheme  for  a  great  foreign  campaign  by  the 
jealousy — so  Thucydides  very  briefly  tells  us — of  “some 
of  the  great  men  at  home.”  With  the  spring  came  an 
armistice  for  a  year,  mainly  on  the  principle  of  the 
uti  possidetis;  both  parties  being  now  desirous  of  peace, 
the  one  to  check  the  rapid  course  of  Brasidas’s  conquests, 
the  other  to  recover  their  valuable  prisoners  taken  on 
Sphakteria,  connected  as  they  doubtless  were  with  the 
leading  families  in  Sparta. 

The  armistice  was  not  altogether  strictly  kept  on 
either  side,  and  the  war,  though  suspended  in  other 
quarters,  went  on  in  Thrace.  Reinforcements  were  sent 
thither  by  both  the  contending  powers.^  And  Nicias, 
who  will  be  remembered  as  the  antagonist  of  Cleon  in 
Athenian  politics,  makes  his  first  prominent  appearance 
in  a  military  capacity,  as  one  of  the  commanders  of  a 
strong  Athenian  force  which  was  landed  on  the  coast 
to  relieve  or  recover  some  of  the  towns  which  had  been 
attacked  by  Brasidas.  When  the  year  of  truce  had  ex¬ 
pired  without  any  step  having  been  taken  on  either  side 
towards  a  lasting  peace,  the  war  was  resumed;  though 
at  first,  as  it  would  appear,  somewhat  reluctantly  and 
slackly  on  both  sides.  The  piiblic  feeling  both  at 
Athens  and  Lacedaemon  was  in  favour  of  negotiation; 
but,  if  we  may  trust  Thucydides,  there  was  one  man  in 
each  state  whom  the  circumstances  of  the  time  had 
raised  to  a  commanding  position — though  the  circum¬ 
stances  were  very  different  in  the  two  cases — and  to 
whom  peace  was  unpalatable.  “  Cleon  and  Brasidas,” 
says  the  historian,  “  were  both  strongly  opposed  to 
peace  :  the  latter  because  he  owed  all  his  success  and 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPIIIPOLIS. 


131 


his  honours  to  war ;  the  former  because,  when  times 
were  quiet,  he  thought  he  should  be  more  readily 
detected  in  his  malpractices,  and  find  his  calumnies  not 
so  greedily  believed.”  *  There  seems  an  unfairness  here 
not  only  to  Cleon,  whom  Thucydides  may  have  been 
inclined  always  to  judge  hardly,  but  to  Brasidas  as 
well,  to  whom  he  is  so  evidently  disposed  to  do  full 
justice.  It  is  surely  quite  possible,  and  quite  in  ac 
cordance  with  all  we  know  of  Brasidas,  that  besides 
the  personal  ambition  and  love  of  distinction  which 
mark  every  able  soldier,  he  may  also  have  had  larger 
and  more  patriotic  aspirations ;  he  may  have  longed  to 
carry  the  war  to  a  triumphant  conclusion,  to  destroy  the 
Athenian  supremacy  in  Thrace,  now  that  he  had  made 
so  promising  a  breach  in  it,  and  to  make  his  own  city, 
and  not  Athens,  once  more  the  centre  of  the  power 
and  influence  of  the  Hellenic  name.  It  is  not  easy, 
again,  to  see  why  war  should  in  itself  have  such  at^ 
tractions  for  a  man  like  Cleon.  If  he  lacked,  as 
Thucydides  would  have  us  think,  and  as  even  his 
advocate  Mr  Grote  thinks,  the  abilities  of  a  com¬ 
mander,  he  was  risking  his  own  reputation  daily  in  a 
state  where  not  to  be  a  soldier  was  to  be  nothing :  and 
it  is  needless  to  say  that  a  desire  for  national  glory, 
and  even  a  sensitiveness  to  national  honour,  are  not 
unfrequently  found  in  the  most  violent  of  popular 
demagogues. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  if  Brasidas  and  Cleon  were  really  . 
the  foremost  advocates  of  the  renewed  war,  they  were 
also  amongst  its  very  first  victims.  Whether  by  his 

*  V.  16. 


BOSTON  COLLEGE  LIBUxiUY 
CHESTNUT  HILL,  MASS. 


132 


THUCYDIDES. 


own  w'isli  or  not, — whether  the  office  was  thrust  upon 
him,  as  in  some  sense  it  was  in  the  matter  of  Sphakteria, 
or  whether  he  sought  it  for  himself,  as  Thucydides 
asserts, — Cleon  went  out,  soon  after  the  termination  of 
the  armistice,  with  an  imposing  force  to  grapple  with 
Brasidas  in  Thrace.  He  began  successfully.  He  took 
the  town  of  Torone,  which  Brasidas  had  wrested  from 
Athenian  rule — that  general,  like  Thucydides  at  Amphi- 
polis,  was  now  too  late  to  save  it — sent  the  Pelopon¬ 
nesian  garrison  and  its  citizens,  700  iu  all,  prisoners  to 
Athens,  and  sold  its  women  and  children  for  slaves. 
The  capture  of  another  town  followed :  and  then  Cleon 
took  up  his  quarters  at  Eion,  watching  his  opportunity 
for  Amphipolis,  and  waiting  for  reinforcements  which 
he  hoped  to  get  from  Perdiccas,  who  had  once  more 
transferred  his  fickle  friendship  to  the  Athenians. 
Brasidas  meanwhile  had  been  strengthening  his  army 
with  Thracian  mercenaries,  and  now'  threw  himself  into 
Amphipolis. 

Cleon,  says  the  historian,  waited  till  his  army  grew 
impatient,  and  almost  forced  him  to  move  upon  the 
town  :  so  long  as  that  was  in  the  hands  of  the  enemy, 
the  honour  of  Athens  was  unavenged,  and  her  Thracian 
interests  in  danger.  He  advanced  near  enough  to 
reconnoitre  the  town  and  its  position,  and  to  regret 
that  he  had  not  brought  engines  with  him  to  take  it. 
He  had  made  up  his  mind  to  retire  his  forces  for  the 
^  time,  to  wait  for  his  expected  reinforcements,  and 
then  to  surround  the  place  on  all  sides,  and  sweep 
down  all  resistance  by  force  of  numbers :  in  fact, 
says  Thucydides,  to  repeat  the  tactics  of  Sphakteriaj 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPHIPOLIS. 


133 


though  it  is  not  easy  to  see  exactly  the  force  of  the 
comparison. 

Brasidas  determined  on  a  sudden  dash,  at  the  head 
of  a  picked  detachment,  right  upon  the  centre  of  the 
enemy’s  line,  as  they  were  on  the  point  of  retiring,  not 
dreaming  of  any  sally  from  the  town.  Before  he 
delivered  his  attack,  he  made  his  last  speech  to  his 
lieutenant,  Clearidas,  and  the  whole  body  of  troops, 
Spartans  and  allies,  drawn  up  within  the  walls.  His 

9 

oration  was  soldier-like,  and  to  the  point.  He  told 
them  his  plan :  after  he  had  made  his  dash,  Clearidas 
was  to  throw  open  the  gates  on  the  other  side,  and 
charge  with  the  main  body.  He  and  his  Spartans 
were  to  behave — as  Spartans  always  did;  and  the 
allies  were  to  choose  between  proving  themselves 
worthy  to  fight  by  the  side  of  freemen,  or  remaining 
the  “slaves  of  Athens.” 

From  the  higher  ground  where  Cleon  was  now  halt¬ 
ing,  the  interior  of  the  town  was  plainly  visible.  The 
movements  now  going  on  within  attracted  his  attention : 
scouts  who  had  ventured  close  up  to  the  walls — for  no 
defenders  showed  themselves — could  see  under  the 
gates  the  close-packed  feet  of  men  and  horses  as  if 
prepared  for  a  saUy  in  force.  Cleon  had  no  mind  for 
a  general  engagement  until  reinforced,  and  gave  orders 
to  withdraw  to  the  old  position  at  Eion.  The  change 
of  movement  was  made  in  haste ;  and  at  that  critical 
moment  Brasidas  and  his  party  made  their  sally,  taking 
their  enemy’s  line  in  flank  as  they  moved  off.  Clear¬ 
idas  followed  up  the  attack.  The  Athenian  left  wing, 
which  was  leading  towards  Eion,  broke  at  once  and 


THUCYDIDES. 


fled.  The  right  re-formed  on  the  hill,  and  made  a  stout 
resistance  for  some  time;  hut  the  light-armed  Thracians 
showered  missiles  upon  them  from  all  sides,  and  at 
last  they  too  broke  their  ranks,  and  the  survivors  made 
their  way  by  various  mountain -paths  hack  to  their 
quarters  at  Eion.  Cleon  was  with  the  right  wing,  hut 
took  to  flight  at  once,  and  met  with  an  ignominious 
death  at  the  hands  of  a  native  targeteer. 

The  Athenians  had  lost  six  hundred  of  their  best 
men ;  the  victors  only  seven.  But  their  "sdctory  that 
day  was  turned  into  mourning.  Among  the  seven, 
carried  off  the  field  early  in  the  action,  mortally 
wounded,  was  Brasidas.  “  They  bore  him,  still  alive, 
into  the  city :  he  lived  to  hear  that  his  side  was  vic¬ 
torious,  but  soon  after  became  unconscious,  and  ex¬ 
pired.”  He  was  buried  with  unusual  honours — “at 
the  public  expense,  within  the  city,  in  front  of  the 
present  market-place;  and  from  that  day  forth  the 
men  of  Amphipolis,  havmg  fenced  his  tomb,  sacrifice 
to  him  as  a  hero,  and  honour  him  with  games  and 
offerings  every  year.”  They  even  adopted  him  for 
their  founder,  instead  of  the  Athenian  Hagnon,  who 
had  'been  the  original  leader  of  the  colony :  Hagnon 
had  but  built  them  walls;  Brasidas  had  laid  the  foimda- 
tions  of  their  liberty.  Unanimous  consent  of  friends 
and  foes  alike  has  pronounced  Brasidas  the  hero  of  the 
war :  he  is  almost  the  only  Spartan  suice  the  days  of 
Leonidas  round  whom  anything  like  a  halo  of  romance 
has  gathered;  and  there  was  probably  something  of 
the  old  heroic  type  in  his  person  and  bearing  as  well 


THUCYDIDES  AT  AMPHIPOLIS. 


135 


as  in  liis  character,  since  Plato,  in  his  ‘Symposium,* 
has  compared  him  with  the  “  perfect  knight  ”  of  classi¬ 
cal  legend — the  faultless  Achilles. 

Thucydides  considers  that  the  deaths  of  Cleon  and 
Brasidas  removed  the  great  obstacle  to  the  peace  which 
had  been  so  long  talked  of.  The  majority  on  both 
sides  were  anxious  for  it,  each  having  their  special 
:easons  for  uneasiness,  and  both  being  tired  of  the 
long  war.  The  Lacedjemonians  knew  that  their  Helot 
population  was  restless :  their  long  truce  with  Argos 
(which  had  been  neuter  in  this  war)  was  on  the  point 
of  expiring,  and  they  had  a  not  unfounded  suspicion  that 
Argos  might  seek  to  form  a  new  confederacy,  of  which 
she  herself  should  be  the  head.  Repeated  conferences 
were  held  during  the  winter.  At  a  convention  of  the 
confederate  Peloponnesians,  the  votes  of  the  large 
majority  were  for  immediate  negotiations — Corinth  and 
Megara  being  among  the  few  dissentients,  the  former 
still  implacably  jealous,  and  the  latter  dreading  the 
final  result  when  Athens  should  find  leism-e  and  op- 
portimity  to  deal  with  her  alone.  At  the  beginning  of 
the  following  spring,  just  ten  years  after  the  first 
invasion  of  Attica,  the  treaty  known  as  the  Peace  of 
Nicias  was  concluded,  for  fifty  years.  Conquests  and 
prisoners  on  both  sides  were  to  be  given  up,  except 
such  places  as  had  accepted  terms  of  capitulation ;  so 
that  the  Thebans  would  still  hold  Platsea,  w'hile  Athens 
retained  possession  of  Nissea,  the  port  of  the  Megarians. 
But  its  stipulations  were  never  carried  into  effect. 
The  Tliracians  refused  to  give  up  Amphipolis,  though 


136 


THUCYDIDES. 


the  Lacedaemonians  did  all  they  could  to  secure  its 
restoration  to  Athens,  withdrawing  their  own  garrison 
at  once.  The  other  more  powerful  allies  of  Lacedae¬ 
mon  repudiated  the  terms  altogether,  and  the  general 
treaty  was  superseded  by  a  defensive  alliance,  for  the 
same  term  of  fifty  years,  between  Athens  and  Sparta 
only. 


CHAPTEE  XI. 


ARGOS. 

The  Peace  of  Xicias,  as  it  was  called,  concluded  pro¬ 
spectively  for  fifty  years,  lasted  somewhat  less  than 
seven.  Even  during  that  period,  the  state  of  things 
was  not  really  peace  at  all,  as  Thucydides  remarks, 
but  merely  a  suspension  of  active  hostilities  between 
Athens  and  Sparta,  and  that  disturbed  by  mutual 
suspicions  and  discontent.  Athens  had  restored  the 
prisoners  of  Sphakteria — the  hostages  who  had  been 
so  valuable  to  her  as  a  material  guarantee;  but  she 
had  not  got  back — for  Sparta  had  declared  herself  not 
in  a  position  to  give  back — ^her  own  town  of  Amphi- 
polis;  and  her  dissatisfaction  was  intense.  A.s  to  the 
rest  of  the  Peloponnesian  confederacy,  so  many  states 
had  refused  to  accept  the  original  treaty,  and  their 
confidence  in  Sparta  as  a  head  had  been  so  materially 
shaken,  that  they  began  to  turn  their  eyes  towards 
Argos  as  a  possible  new  leader  for  Greece.  With  hei 
resources  fresh  and  unexhausted,  having  been  resting 
while  others  were  fighting,  and  with  all  live  prestige  ol 
a  traditional  supremacy  as  old  as  the  Gcge  of  Troy, 
she  formed  a  natural  rallying-point  for  the  ?maller  states. 


138 


THUCYDIDES. 


Corinth,  the  leader  of  the  malcontents,  had  sent  her 
envoys  to  Argos  straight  from  the  last  congress  of  the 
confederates;  and,  after  some  secret  negotiations,  a 
new  league  was  formed,  of  which  Argos  was  to  he  the 
head,  and  Corinth,  Elis,  and  others  of  less  importance, 
were  to  be  members.  The  Spartans  became  alarmed, 
and  a  party  there  endeavoured  to  make  a  separate 
alliance  for  their  own  state  with  Argos ;  but,  owing  to 
a  misunderstanding,  the  project  failed.  In  fact,  Argos 
for  the  time  seemed  mistress  of  the  situation,  for  all 
Greece  was  suing  for  her  favours.  Advances  were 
made  to  her  from  Athens,  where  a  young  man  had 
just  come  forward  into  public  life  who  was  to  play 
a  brilliant  but  mischievous  part  among  his  fellow- 
citizens.  Alcibiades  is  introduced  to  us  by  the  his¬ 
torian  with  the  same  abruptness  as  Pericles ;  he 
considers  him,  no  doubt  (as  he  must  here  be  con¬ 
sidered),  already  well  known  to  his  readers  by  name 
and  repute.  Connected  with  Pericles  by  the  mother’s 
side  through  the  same  great  house  of  Alcmseon,  he  was 
a  very  different  man  from  his  great  relative.  Strik¬ 
ingly  handsome  and  accomplished  like. him,  clever  and 
ambitious,  he  was  utterly  devoid  of  moral  principle 
and  of  anything  like  earnest  patriotism.  He  now 
warmly  advocated  a  renunciation  of  the  treaty  with 
Sparta,  and  an  immediate  alliance  with  Argos.  Partly, 
Thucydides  thinks,  because  he  really  thought  such  a 
course  was  best  for  the  interests  of  Athens;  “  but,”  con¬ 
tinues  the  historian,  “  also  because  he  was  opposed  to 
the  late  treaty  from  a  feeling  of  jealousy,  because  the 
Lacedaemonians  had  negotiated  it  through  the  agency 


ARGOS. 


139 


of  Nicias  and  Laches,  while  they  passed  him  over  on 
account  of  his  youth,  and  did  not  treat  him  with 
the  respect  due  to  the  old  public  connection  of  his 
family  with  their  city — a  connection  which,  though 
his  grandfather  had  renounced  it,  he  had  himself 
thought  to  renew  by  his  attention  to  their  prisoners 
from  the  island.”  Alcibiades  asserted  that  the  real 
object  which  Sparta  had  in  view,  in  proposing  the 
existing  treaty,  was  to  prevent  Athens  from  obtaining 
Argos  as  an  ally.  He  induced  this  latter  state  to  send 
proposals  to  Athens,  which  he  supported  by  the  most 
unscrupulous  stratagem.  Sparta,  thoroughly  alarmed, 
had  sent  her  own  envoys  to  Athens  at  the  same  time 
to  remonstrate  against  this  new  confederacy.  In  a 
private  interview,  Alcibiades  represented  himself  as  the 
supporter  of  Spartan  interests,  won  their  confidence, 
and  suggested  to  them  a  line  of  dissimulation  which 
he  was  immediately  the  first  to  denoimce  in  the  public 
assembly.  In  spite  of  the  strong  opposition  of  Hicias 
and  others,  a  treaty  between  Athens  and  Argos,  in 
which  Elis  was  also  included — “  for  a  hundred  years  ” 
— was  finally  arranged ;  though  it  was  not  construed 
as  necessarily  putting  an  end  to  the  existing  peaceful 
relations  with  Sparta. 

Some  minor  hostilities,  during  which  a  fruitless 
effort  was  made  by  Athens  to  open  negotiations  for  a 
general  peace,  were  followed  by  an  invasion  of  the 
territory  of  Argos  by  the  Lacedaemonians  in  fidl  force, 
supported  by  large  contingents  of  their  Corinthian  and 
other  allies.  They  succeeded  in  throwing  themselves 
r^tween  the  Argive  army  and  the  city  of  Argos,  and, 


140 


THUCYDIDES. 


in  fact,  nearly  surrounding  them  in  their  position. 
The  Argives,  however,  obtained  an  armistice  from 
Agis,  the  Spartan  king,  who  was  commander-in-chief, 
and  he  withdrew  from  his  position  of  advantage. 
“  The  Lacedaemonians  followed  him,”  says  our  author, 
“  because  he  was  in  command,  in  obedience  to  law,  hut 
they  blamed  him  loudly  amongst  each  other  :  for  this 
was  the  finest  army  of  Greeks  which  up  to  that  time 
had  ever  been  assembled;  and  it  presented  that  ap¬ 
pearance  thoroughly  while  it  was  in  full  strength  at 
Nemea — all  picked  men  of  their  respective  nationali¬ 
ties,  and  a  match  apparently  not  only  for  the  Argive 
league,  hut  for  another  added  to  that.”*  But,  as  a 
remarkable  instance  how  little  military  tactics  and 
positions  are  understood,  in  all  times,  except  by  the 
few  experts,  the  mass  of  the  Argives,  Thucydides  tells 
us,  were  equally  angry  with  their  generals  for  allowing 
(as  they  supposed)  the  enemy  to  escape.  There  can 
be  little  doubt  that  the  historian  was  in  the  immediate 
neighbourhood  of  Mantineia  at  the  time  of  the  battle, 
and  had  seen  the  array  of  the  confederated  forces  with 
his  own  eyes. 

The  armistice  was  tacitly  annulled  by  both  com¬ 
batants  ;  and  the  Argives,  now  strongly  reinforced  by 
a  division  of  Athenians  (which  was  accompanied  by 
Alcibiades  himself  in  some  civil  capacity),  marched 
into  the  central  plain  of  the  Peloponnese,  known  as  a 
district  by  the  name  of  Arcadia,  but  where  the  two 
powerful  towns  of  Mantineia  and  Tegea  were  now  at 
feud — the  latter  adhering  to  Lacedaemon,  while  Man- 


*  V.  60. 


ARGOS. 


141 


tineia  had  joined  tlie  new  Argive  league.  The  Lacedae¬ 
monians  hurried  with  all  the  troops  they  could  muster, 
Helots  included,  and  “by  a  more  rapid  march  than 
they  had  ever  been  known  to  make  before,”  to  defend 
their  Arcadian  ally ;  and  before  Mantineia  the  armies 
of  the  two  confederacies  met  at  last  in  a  bloody  and 
decisive  battle.  Each  commander  of  the  allies  on  both 
sides  harangued  his  own  troops  before  the  engagement, 
excepting  only  the  Spartan  king.  His  men,  singing  their 
national  war-songs,  “  exhorted  each  other  to  remember 
all  their  cunning,  as  brave  men  should,  knowing  that 
long  training  in  action  is  a  better  security  than  an 
extempore  exhortation,  however  well  expressed  in 
words.”  The  historian  tells  us  how  “the  Argives 
and  their  allies  moved  forward  rapidly  and  with  ex¬ 
citement,  while  the  Lacedaemonians  marched  slowly, 
to  the  music  of  a  number  of  pipers,  as  is  their  estab¬ 
lished  custom,  not  from  any  religious  feeliug,  but 
that  they  may  advance  in  even  line  and  keeping  step, 
and  that  their  ranks  may  not  be  broken — as  is  very 
much  wont  to  be  the  case  with  large  armies  when  they 
advance.”  *  The  writer  gives  us  here  also  a  short 
professional  criticism  on  the  military  tactics  of  the 
day.  All  armies,  he  says,  thrust  out  the  line  too  much 
by  their  right  when  they  close;  because  every  man 
tries  to  protect  his  right  (where  he  has  no  shield)  by 
the  shield  of  his  right-hand  man.  The  Lacedcemonians 
gained  a  complete  victory,  and  piled  arms  and  erected 
a  trophy  on  the  field  of  battle.  The  enemy  lost  in  all 
1100  men,  including  both  the  Athenian  commanders: 

*  V.  70- 


142 


THUCYDIDES. 


the  loss  of  the  Lacedaemonians  was  supposed  to  have 
been  not  more  than  300. 

This  victory  restored  at  once  the  honour  and  prestige 
of  the  Lacedaemonian  name.  Men  now  began  to  argue, 
says  the  historian,  “that  they  had  been  worsted  by 
accident,  but  in  spirit  they  had  been  always  the  same.” 
To  Argos  the  immediate  result  was  curious,  and  prob¬ 
ably  unexpected.  In  that  state  there  was  a  party  which 
had  always  been  in  favour  of  alliance  with  Lacedae¬ 
mon.  The  picked  body  of  1000  heavy-armed  infantry, 
a  kind  of  garde  noble  composed  exclusively  of  young 
men  of  the  higher  classes,  had  been  victorious  in  their 
own  quarter  of  the  battle,  had  broken  the  left  wing  of 
the  enemy,  and  maintained  the  honour  of  their  native 
city.  They  seem  now  to  have  had  influence  enough 
with  their  feUow-citizens  to  effect  a  bloodless  revolu¬ 
tion,  to  put  down  the  democracy,  to  break  with  demo¬ 
cratic  Athens,  and  to  join  their  late  conquerors,  the 
more  aristocratic  and  conservative  Lacedaemonians,  with 
whom  an  alliance  was  concluded  for  the  favourite  term 
of  fifty  years.  It  lasted  some  few  months.  Then  the 
commons  of  Argos  rose  against  the  oligarchy,  regained 
their  power,  and  put  their  city  again  in  alliance  with 
Athens.  They  even  began  to  build  long  walls  down 
from  the  city  to  the  harbour,  so  as  to  be  able  in  future 
to  communicate  easily  with  their  powerful  friends  by 
sea ;  but  these  works  the  Lacedaemonians  succeeded  in 
destroying. 


CHAPTER  XIL 


THE  FATE  OF  MELOS. 

The  ^gean  Sea  (or,  as  we  now  call  it,  the  Archi¬ 
pelago)  has  been  fairly  described  as  being  at  this 
period  “an  Athenian  lake.”  But  the  island  of  Melos 
formed  a  striking  exception.  It  was  a  Lacedaemonian 
— f.e.,  a  Dorian — colony,  alien  in  race  and  habits  from 
its  neighbours  of  Ionian  descent,  and  had  at  first  been 
neutral  in  this  contest.  The  Athenians  had  sent  a  small 
squadron  there  in  the  sixth  year  of  the  war,  and  tried 
to  enforce  submission  by  ravaging  their  lands,  but 
without  making  any  impression  on  their  stubborn  in¬ 
dependence.  They  now  sent  a  stronger  force,  but 
with  orders  to  treat  with  the  inhabitants  before  com¬ 
mitting  any  act  of  hostility.  This  led  to  a  curious’ 
conference,  which  the  author  professes  to  report  in 
full,  between  the  Melian  authorities  and  the  Athenian 
envoys,  who  were  not  admitted  to  an  audience  in  the 
popular  assembly  of  the  island.  The  dialogue,  too 
long  for  reproduction  here,  is  almost  dramatic.  The 
Athenians  request  that  they  may  be  allowed  to  state 
their  propositions  and  arguments  seriatim,  and  to  meet 
any  objections  in  detail.  After  some  preliminary 


144 


THUCYDIDES. 


fencing,  the  Athenian  spokesman  is  made  to  use  the 
following  language,  to  which  no  objection  could  pos¬ 
sibly  he  made  on  the  ground  of  ambiguity  or  lack  of 
plain  dealing : — 

‘‘Well,  we  have  no  intention  on  our  part  to  set 
forth  a  long  story  (to  which  you  would  give  no 
credit),  with  plausible  assertions  of  our  right  to  assume 
this  supremacy  after  we  had  broken  the  power  of 
the  Mede,  or  of  our  coming  against  you  now  because 
we  are  the  injured  party;  nor  do  we  want  to  hear 
from  you  that,  though  colonists  from  Lacedaemon,  you 
have  not  joined  her  in  this  war,  or  that  you  have  done 
us  no  harm — that  would  not  affect  our  determination. 
But  we  advise  you  to  act  in  accordance  with  the  real 
sentiments  of  both  parties,  and  to  make  the  best  terms 
you  can  under  the  circumstances ;  for  you  know,  and 
we  know,  that,  in  men’s  dealings  with  each  other,  ab¬ 
stract  right  is  considered  only  when  both  stand  on 
equal  terms :  in  other  cases,  the  stronger  party  exact  all 
they  can,  and  the  weaker  have  to  give  way.” — (V.  89.) 

■  The  Melians  submit  that,  even  as  a  question  of  ex¬ 
pediency,  it  is  not  well  for  the  stronger  to  be  too  over¬ 
hearing  :  the  Athenians  would  he  setting  a  precedent 
which  might  some  day  he  turned  against  themselves,  in 
case  of  a  reverse  of  fortune.  The  Athenians,  in  reply, 
beg  the  islanders  not  to  trouble  themselves  on  that  point 
— the  future  of  Athens  they  are  content  to  risk  for  them¬ 
selves.  For  the  present,  the  submission  of  the  Melians 
is  for  the  advantage  of  both  parties  :  it  will  save  them- 


THE  FATE  OF  MELOS. 


145 


selves  much  suffering,  and  Athens  will  thereby  gain  a 
subject  instead  of  having  to  destroy  an  enemy.  The 
Melians  ask  why  they  may  not  be  allowed  to  remain  in 
a  state  of  friendly  neutrality?  ]^o, — to  recognise  such  a 
position  would  be  a  confession  of  weakness  on  the  part 
of  the  Athenians  :  it  would  .imply  an  inability  to  reduce 
them  by  force;  The  Melians  argue  that  if  Athens  will 
risk  so  much  for  empire,  they  themselves  are  surely 
justified  in  risking  something  for  independence  :  they 
are  answered, — it  is  a  question  for  them  not  of  honour, 
but  of  life  or  death.  They  remind  the  Athenians  that, 
after  all,  the  fortune  of  war  is  always  uncertain ;  the 
reply  is,  that  nothing  is  so  ruinous  to  men  and  states 
as  hqpe,  when  hope  means  only  dependence  on  the 
chapter  of  accidents ;  let  them  “  not  show  the  folly 
of  those  who,  when  they  might  save  themselves  by 
human  prudence,  take  refuge  in  visionary  dreams,  like 
soothsaying  and  oracles,  which  only  ruin  those  who 
trust  them.”  The  Melians  contend  that  they  have 
reasonable  ground  of  hope,  in  their  own  case  ]  the  gods 
will  aid  the  right,  and  the  Lacedgemonians  will  not  fail 
to  succour  them — from  a  sense  of  honour,  if  for  no 
other  reason.  The  Athenian  answers  something  in  the 
IS'apoleonic  spirit,  that  the  gods  are  on  the  whole  “  in 
favour  of  strong  battalions :  ”  being  much  given  to 
maintain  their  own  dominion  by  the  strong  hand.  As 
to  the  notion  that  the  Lacedaemonians  will  help  them 
out  of  a  sense  of  honour, — “  we  bless  your  innocent 
hearts,”  says  the  speaker,  “  but  we  don’t  envy  your 
■common-sense ;  ”  the  Lacedaemonians  have  too  shrewd 
A.C.8.S.  VoL  VL  K 


146 


THUCYDIDES.  . 


a  regard  for  their  own  interests  to  encounter  Athens 
by  sea  in  defence  of  a  colony.  The  colonists — whose 
argument  grows  sensibly  weaker  and  less  confident — 
reply  that  the  Lacedaemonians  could  avenge  themselves 
on  Athens  by  land.  The  Athenians  close  the  discussion 
by  strongly  advising  the  Melians  to  reconsider  seriously 
their  intention  of  resistance.  The  latter  continued  re¬ 
solute,  however,  in  their  refusal  of  submission,  though 
they  still  offered  to  remain  neutral :  and  the  Athenian 
envoys  retired  to  their  own  lines,  after  an  ominous 
warning  that  “  men  who  staked  their  confidence  on 
such  things  as  Lacedaemonians,  and  fortune,  and  hope,” 
and  suchlike  broken  reeds,  were  like  to  find  themselves 
bitterly  disappointed.  So  it  proved  in  the  result. 
Works  of  circumvallation  were  immediately  begun,  and 
the  place  was  closely  invested  by  land  and  sea ;  the 
Lacedaemonians  never  stirred  to  save  them;  and  although 
the  Melians  twice  broke  through  the  besiegers’  lines  and 
carried  in  provisions,  they  were  reduced  in  the  course 
of  the  following  winter  to  surrender  at  discretion.  The 
Athenians  slaughtered  all  the  men  in  cold  blood,  and 
made  slaves  of  the  women  and  children  :  and  their 
historian  relates  the  fact  without  a  word  of  reprobation. 
There  does  not  appear  to  have  been,  in  this  case,  even 
a  reference  to  the  decision  of  the  Assembly  at  Athens. 
Atrocious  as  such  an  act  would  appear  to  us,  in  the 
case  of  prisoners  of  war  who  had  surrendered  at  dis¬ 
cretion,  it  was  not  repugnant  to  the  savage  war-code  of 
the  day.  The  islanders  had  their  fate,  in  case  of  re¬ 
sistance,  set  before  them  in  very  plain  words  by  the 


THE  FATE  OF  MELOS. 


147 


Athenian  speaker ;  they  knew  what  had  been  done  by 
the  Lacedaemonians  at  Plataea,  and  by  the  Athenians 
at  Mitylen^ ;  and  though  they  remonstrate  strongly 
against  the  whole  proceeding  as  an  unwarrantable 
aggression,  they  enter  no  special  protest  against  the 
cruelty  of  the  alternative,  and  make  their  election  with 
all  the  consequences  before  their  eyes.* 

The  insolent  frankness  with  which  the  Athenian  in 
the  dialogue  is  made  to  put  forward  the  principle  that 
“  might  makes  right  ”  has  led  a  very  early  critic  to 
suspect  that  Thucydides,  writing  in  the  bitterness  of 
exile,  chose  to  set  forth  the  policy  of  Athens  in  the  most 
invidious  colours.!  Such  a  charge  is  highly  improb¬ 
able  :  there  was  nothing  to  have  prevented  the  historian 
from  doing  the  same  in  other  passages  of  his  work 
which  internal  evidence  shows  to  have  been  written 
under  the  same  circumstances.  But  though  the  prin¬ 
ciple  is  here  asserted  in  language  almost  brutal  in  its 
directness,  it  is  the  principle  which,  veOed  in  a  soph¬ 
istry  more  or  less  transparent,  appears  in  some  shape 
on  every  occasion  when  the  Athenians  come  forward 

*Bp.  Thirlvvall’s  remark  upon  the  massacre  at  Melos  is  sufR- 
ciently  caustic  :  “The  milder  spirit  of  modern  manners  would 
not  have  punished  men,  who  had  heen  guilty  of  no  offence 
but  the  assertion  of  their  rightful  independence,  more  severely 
than  by  tearing  them  from  their  families,  and  locking  tJiem  up 
in  a  fortress,  or  transporting  them  to  the  wilds  of  Scythia.  But 
our  exultation  at  the  progress  of  humanity  may  be  consistent 
with  a  charitable  indulgence  for  the  imperfections  of  a  lower 
stage  of  civilisation.” 

t  Dionysius,  Judicium  de  Thucyd.,  pp.  37-42. 


U8 


THUCYDIDES. 


either  as  complainants  or  apologists.  They  had  gained 
their  empire  fairly, — they  meant  to  keep  it :  it  was  a 
despotism,  which  admitted  no  resistance ;  and  the  laws 
of  justice  and  humanity  had  force  only  amongst  equals 
under  equal  circumstances  :  they  had  no  place  in  the 
relations  of  weak  states  to  the  stronger. 


CHAPTER  XIIL 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 

With  his  sixth  hook,  Thucydides  begins  what  might 
he  called  the  history  of  the  decline  and  fall  of  Athens. 
In  this  and  the  following  book  the  interest  of  his  story 
culminates ;  and  at  the  conclusion  of  the  seventh  he 
brings  us,  with  a  rapidity  of  narration  which  is  per¬ 
haps  intentional,  to  the  collapse  (for  it  is  little  less)  of 
that  remarkable  empire  whose  growth  and  strength  he 
has  been  tracing.  The  tale  of  the  Athenian  expedition 
against  Syracuse  becomes  in  his  hands  one  of  the  most 
perfect  dramas  in  history,  and  is  told,  from  introduc¬ 
tion  to  catastrophe,  with  the  most  consummate  ’skill. 

We  must  go  back  some  ten  years,  in  order  to  trace 
the  first  interference  of  Athens  in  the  affairs  of  Sicily, 
which  was  to  exercise  so  fatal  an  influence  upon  her 
fortunes  in  the  sequel.  That  island  was  largely  occu¬ 
pied,  especially  on  the  southern  and  eastern  coasts,  by 
prosperous  colonies  from  Greece;  and  of  these,  some 
were  of  Dorian  and  others  of  Ionian  race.  The  same 
division  of  sympathies  existed,  therefore,  among  the 
Greeks  in  Sicily  as  in  the  mother  country.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  war,  Sparta  had  sent  a  requisition  to 


150 


THUCYDIDES. 


the  Dorian  sea-coast  towns,  the  chief  of  which  were 
Syracuse  and  Agrigentum,  to  furnish  a  contingent  of 
war-galleys :  but  they  seem  to  have  contented  them¬ 
selves  with  taking  the  opportunity  of  attacking  their 
Ionian  neighbours  on  the  island.  One  of  these, 
Leontini,  in  the  fifth  year  of  the  war,  had  appealed 
for  aid  to  Athens  against  the  aggressions  of  Syracuse. 
A  small  squadron  was  sent  with  the  further  important 
object  of  stopping  the  exportation  of  corn  from  Sicily 
into  the  Peloponnese,  and  of  ascertaining  what  chance 
there  might  be  of  reducing  the  whole  island.  There 
was  not  much  result  either  from  this  or  from  a  sub¬ 
sequent  expedition,  beyond  a  temporary  occupation  of 
Mess^ne,  at  that  time  a  town  of  not  much  importance. 
Athenian  and  Syracusan  squadrons  had  occasional  in¬ 
decisive  engagements  in  Sicilian  waters ;  but  the  more 
important  expedition  sent  out  under  Eurymedon  had 
been  diverted,  as  may  be  remembered,  by  the  descent 
upon  Pylos,  and  arrived  on  the  coast  of  Sicily  too  late 
in  the  season  for  any  large  operations.* 

In  the  eighth  year  of  the  war,  the  internal  feuds  of 
the  island  being  for  the  time  in  abeyance,  a  congress 
of  representatives  from  most  of  the  Sicilian  towns  was 
held,  with  a  view  to  a  general  pacification.  The  lead¬ 
ing  spirit  in  the  congress  was  Hermocrates  of  Syracuse, 
a  man  of  eminent  abilities  and  high  personal  character, 
representing,  hoAvever,  only  one  political  interest  in 
his  native  city — the  oligarchical.  In  the  speech  with 
which  the  historian  has  furnished  him  (we  can  hardly 
suppose  that,  in  the  case  of  a  Sicilian  speaker,  any- 


*  See  p.  110. 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


151 


thing  bcyojid  the  merest  outline  of  liis  argument  can 
have  been  preserved),  he  urges  strongly  upon  all  his 
countrymen— Dorians,  lonians,  or  others — the  para¬ 
mount  necessity  of  union  among  themselves  in  the 
presence  of  a  foreign  enemy,  always  on  the  watch  to 
take  advantage  of  their  internal  quarrels.*  He  warns 
them  that  the  ultimate  aim  of  Athens  is  not  the  sup¬ 
port  of  Ionian  colonists,  hut  nothing  less  than  the  sub¬ 
jugation  of  the  island.  He  bids  them  all  remember 
that,  whether  Dorians  or  lonians,  they  were  Sicilians 
first.  “  I  make  considerable  allowance,”  he  says,  for 
the  Athenians,  in  these  ambitious  designs  and  schemes 
of  conquest :  it  is  not  those  who  aspire  to  empire  that 
I  blame,  hut  those  who  are  only  too  ready  to  make 
submission.  It  is  the  nature  of  men,  everywhere  and 
<ilways,  to  lord  it  over  those  who  yield,  hut  to  have  a 
tare  of  those  who  hold  their  own.”  The  advice  was 
taken — for  the  time ;  and  the  Athenian  commanders, 
naving  assented  to  the  general  treaty  of  pacification, 
left  the  coasts  of  Sicily.  But  the  Athenian  Assembly, 
indignant  at  the  disappointment  of  their  projects,  and 
believing,  or  pretending  to  believe,  that  their  officers 
had  been  bribed,  punished  them  by  exile  on  their 
retinn.  Am  attempt  was  subsequently  made  on  the 
part  of  Athitis  to  support  an  attack  on  Syracuse  by 
some  of  her  neighbours,  but  without  success. 

But  now,  in  the  sixteenth  winter  of  the  war,  an 
expedition  on .  a  large  scale,  with  the  scarcely  veiled 
design  of  a  complete  subjugation  of  the  island,  was 
proposed  and  debated  at  Athens.  A  deputation  from 

*  IV.  59-65 


152 


THUCYDIDES. 


the  town  of  Segest^,  asking  aid  against  Syracuse,  and 
promising  money  for  the  war,  furnished  the  pretext 
But  the  real  object  of  its  chief  promoters,  among  whom 
Alcihiades  stood  foremost,  was  the  extension  of  their 
foreign  dominion — it  might  he,  not  only  to  Sicily  hut 
to  Carthage.  It  was  determined  to  send  a  fleet  of  sixty 
galleys  under  Alcihiades,  ISTicias,  and  Lamachus,  not 
only  to  succour  their  Ionian  allies,  hut  with  the  wide 
instructions  “to  do  what  seemed  best  for  Athenian 
interests  in  Sicily.”  Few  of  the  Athenians,  as  their 
historian  admits,  knew  much  about  the  extent  and 
resources  of  the  island,  or  were  aware  “  that  they  were 
undertaking  a  war  of  hardly  less  proportions  than  that 
against  the  Peloponnesians.”  But  one  man  at  least  in 
Athens  had  a  true  conception  of  the  magnitude  of  the 
risk.  This  was  Hicias,  appointed  to  the  command,  we 
are  told,  “  against  his  will.”  Prudent  and  cautious — 
his  opponents  called  him  over-cautious — perhaps  of  a 
somewhat  despondent  temperament  for  an  Athenian, 
hut  of  sterling  honesty  of  purpose  and  undoubted  per¬ 
sonal  courage,  he  took  upon  himself  to  set  before  his 
countrymen  the  unpopular  side  of  the  question.  In 
an  Assembly  summoned  for  the  purpose  of  voting  the 
necessary  supplies  for  the  expedition,  he  raised  afresh 
the  whole  question  of  the  expedition  itself. 

He  begins  by  confessing  that  he  knew  the  temper 
of  his  fellow-citizens  too  well  to  entertain  any  hope  of 
persuading  them  “  not  to  risk  the  secure  enjoyment  of 
the  present  in  grasping  at  a  visionary  future ;  ”  but  he 
would  try  to  show  them  that,  in  this  case,  at  any  rate, 
the  risks  were  too  grave.  With  so  many  subject-allies, 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


153 


in  Thrace  and  elsewhere,  already  wavering  in  their 
allegiance — with  Sparta  burning  to  revenge  her  late 
disaster — with  an  exchequer  and  a  population  greatly 
in  need  of  recruiting, — they  were  going  to  take  up  the 
burden  of  a  new  and  distant  war.  While  they  were 
leaving  active  enemies  behind  in  Greece,  they  were 
going  to  tempt  new  ones  to  cross  the  sea  against  them. 
Even  if  they  conquered  Sicily,  they  could  not  retain 
it.  Then  he  turns  and  makes  a  personal  attack  on 
Alcibiades,  who  probably  was  sitting  close  by,  and 
who  had  been  from  the  first  one  of  the  loudest  ad¬ 
vocates  of  the  enterprise — an  attack  strangely  bitter 
and  vehement,  when  we  consider  they  were  to  go  out 
in  joint  command  of  the  expeditionary  forces  : — • 

“  If  there  be  any  one  here  who,  elated  at  being 
appointed  to  a  command,  is  urging  you  to  set  sail, 
looking  to  his  own  interest  only, — especially  as  being 
somewhat  young  for  such  high  office, — in  the  hope  of 
winning  admiration  for  his  stud  of  horses  and  chariots, 
and  of  recouping  himself  somewhat  for  an  extravagant 
expenditure  out  of  the  profits  of  his  appointment,  do 
not  give  him  the  opportunity  of  making  a  brilliant 
personal  figure  at  the  cost  of  national  peril;  but  be 
assured  that  such  men  not  only  waste  their  own  sub¬ 
stance,  but  wrong  the  state ;  and  that  this  business  is 
a  weighty  one,  and  no  fit  matter  for  a  youngster  either 
to  discuss  in  council  or  to  be  so  hasty  to  take  in  hand. 
I  have  grave  fears  when  I  see  those  who  sit  there  by 
his  side  and  cheer  his  sentiments ;  and  I  appeal  in  my 
turn  to  the  elder  citizens  among  you,  if  any  of  you 


154 


TIIUCVDIDES. 


chance  to  he  sitting  next  to  the  men  I  mean,  not  to 
he  shamed  out  of  yonr  opinion,  nor  fear  to  be  thouglit 
cowards  because  you  will  not  vote  for  war,  nor  be 
seized,  like  them,  with  a  mad  passion  for  far-off  possi 
bilities  ;  remembering  that  the  lust  of  ambition  rarely 
achieves  success,  while  a  thoughtful  policy  commonly 
does.”— (VI.  12,  13.) 

Ko  wonder  that  Alcibiades,  proud  and  impulsive, 
backed  by  the  younger  spirits  of  whom  he  was  the 
admired  leader,  and  confident  that  he  carried  the  popu¬ 
lar  feeling  with  him  in  favour  of  the  enterprise,  turned 
round  upon  his  older  and  more  cautious  colleague  with 
a  haughty  and  contemptuous  frankness.  He  was 
young,  he  confessed :  men  called  him  extravagant  in 
his  expenditure.  Eut  youth  had  its  place  in  the 
state  as  well  as  old  age.  The  very  magnificence  of  his 
late  display  at  the  Olympic  games  had  tended  to  the 
honour  not  only  of  his  ancestors  and  himself,  but  of 
his  country : — 

“  Seven  chariots  did  I  enter — a  number  which  no 
private  individual  ever  reached  before — and  I  won 
the  crown,  and  was  second  and  fourth  besides,  and 
entertained  liberally  in  every  way,  as  such  a  triumph 
deserved.  To  such  things  honour  attaches,  by  common 
consent;  but  they  also  give  an  impression  of  power 
by  their  performance.  So,  again,  whenever  I  make 
a  gallant  show  in  my  office  of  Choragus  *  at  home,  it 

*  Certain  public  offices  at  Athens — notably  the  furnishing 
the  Chorus  for  the  drama  and  equipping  the  war-galleys—  wei-e 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


155 


may  raise  envy  in  my  fellow-citizens,  very  naturally ; 
but  in  the  eyes  of  foreigners  this  also  implies  strength. 
And  this  folly  that  they  charge  me  with  is  not  without 
its  use,  when  a  man  by  his  private  expenditure  raises 
not  himself  only  to  distinction,  but  his  country.  Nor 
is  it  unfair  that  those  who  have  high  aspirations  should 
hold  themselves  above  the  ordinary  level,  since  the  less 
fortunate  find  none  who  claim  to  stand  on  their  level 
in  their  distress.  If  we  are  none  of  us  courted  in 
adversity,  let  us  lay  our  account  to  be  slighted  by 
those  in  prosperity;  or  else  behave  to  all  alike,  and 
then  claim  the  like  treatment  from  others.  I  know, 
however,  that  men  like  myself,  and  all  who  outshine 
others  in  splendour  of  life,  are  objects  of  jealousy  in 
their  own  day,  to  their  equals  especially,  and  also 
to  the  general  public  among  whom  they  live.  But 
none  the  less,  they  leave  future  generations  eager -to 
claim  kindred  with  them,  even  where  no  such  claim 
exists ;  while  their  country  makes  its  boast  of  them, 
as  no  aliens  or  misdoers,  but  as  her  own  genuine 
children,  and  children  who  have  done  gallant  deed«.” 
—(VI.  16.) 


He  scoffs  at  the  idea  of  any  effectual  resistance  on 
the  part  of  the  Sicilians — “  a  mixed  rabble,  distracted 
by  faction  in  every  town,  and  eager  for  change.”  He 
protests  against  refusing  aid  to  an  ally  merely  because 
he  is  distant  and  apparently  unprofitable.  Such  never 

discharged  by  the  richest  citizens  at  their  own  expense  ;  and 
they  sometimes  vied  with  each  other  in  their  liberal  expenditure 
on  such  occasions. 


156 


THUCYDIDES. 


had  been  —  such  never  should  he  —  the  policy  ol 
Athens 

Nicias  made  one  more  attempt  to  dissuade  his 
countrymen  from  the  enterprise,  by  representing  to 
the  Assembly  the  large  scale  on  which  preparations 
would  have  to  be  made.  Ajq.  overwhelming  naval 
force,  a  strong  body  of  heavy  and  light  armed  infantry, 
archers  and  slingers,  plentiful  supplies  both  of  corn 
and  of  money,  all  must  be  provided  as  for  those  who 
would  have  to  maintain  themselves,  from  the  first,  in 
an  enemy’s  country.  If  he  was  thought  to  be  re¬ 
quiring  too  much,  he  would  readily  resign  his  com¬ 
mand.  The  only  reply  was  to  bid  him  name  his 
wants.  A  hundred  three-banked  war-galleys,  5000 
heavy  infantry,  and  light  troops  in  proportion,  Avere 
voted  at  once,  and  full  powers  given  to  the  three 
generals  who  were  to  go  out  in  command : — 

“An  eager  longing  for  this  expedition  had  fallen 
upon  all  alil?:e.  The  elder  thought  they  must  surely 
conquer  those  against  whom  they  were  sailing,  or  that 
so  large  an  armament  could  at  least  meet  with  no 
disaster.  Those  who  were  yet  young  Avere  longing  to 
see  and  explore  a  foreign  country,  and  sanguhie  of 
coming  home  again  safe.  The  mass  of  the  people, 
and  the  soldiery,  thought  they  should  make  money 
for  the  immediate  present,  and  gain  an  accession  of 
dominion  which  would  supply  a  never-failing  fund  for 
pay.  So  that,  OAving  to  the  intense  eagerness  of  the 
majority,  any  man  who  did  not  regard  the  enterprise 
with  favour  held  his  peace,  for  fear  lest,  if  he  A^oted 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


157 


against  it,  lie  should  he  reckoned  disaffected  to  the 
state.” — (VI.  24.) 

So,  at  dawn  on  a  midsummer  day,  the  Athenians 
and  their  allies  went  on  hoard  their  galleys  in  the 
harbour  of  the  Pirceus.  It  was  the  most  splendidly 
equipped  force,  though  not  the  largest,  which  ever 
went  out  of  a  Greek  city.  The  captains  had  vied  with 
each  other  in  the  liberality  with  which  they  armed  and 
manned  their  galleys.  It  was  the  most  distant  expedi¬ 
tion,  too,  which  Athens  had  undertaken,  and  with  the 
most  ambitious  hopes.  The  historian,  concise  and 
unimpassioned  almost  to  a  fault  on  most  occasions, 
here  warms  into  vivid  description : — 

“  The  whole  population  of  the  city,  one  might  say, 
natives  and  sojourners  alike,  went  down  in  a  body  to 
accompany  them,  the  citizens  escorting  each  their  own 
immediate  friends, — some  their  comrades,  some  their 
kinsmen,  others  their  sons, — with  mingled  hopes  and 
lamentations  ;  hopes  of  new  acquisitions  abroad, 
lamentations  as  for  those  they  might  never  see 
again,  rememberiug  on  what  a  long  voyage  from 
their  native  country  they  were  setting  forth ;  and  at 
this  moment,  when  they  were  on  the  point  of  taking 
leave  of  each  other  with  all  the  perils  before  them, 
the  darker  view  was  more  present  to  them  than  when 
they  had  voted  for  the  expedition.  Yet  nevertheless 
they  took  courage  when  they  saw  their  actual  strength, 
from  the  completeness  of  the  force  in  every  detail. 
The  foreigners  and  the  general  crowd  had  come  as  to 


158 


THUCYDIDES. 


a  spectacle,  to  look  upon  an  armament  well  worth 
seeing,  and  even  surpassing  belief. 

•  •••••• 

“  Now  when  the  crews  had  embarked,  and  every¬ 
thing  was  got  on  board  which  they  were  to  take  with 
them,  silence  was  proclaimed  by  sound  of  trumpet, 
and  they  offered  the  stated  prayers  before  piitting  to 
sea,  not  separately  ship  by  ship,  but  all  together,  at 
the  leading  of  a  herald;  and  they  mixed  bowls  of 
wine  throughout  the  whole  force,  officers  and  men 
pouring  libations  from  gold  and  silver  cups.  And  the 
whole  multitude  on  shore  joined  in  the  prayers,  both 
citizens  and  all  who  were  present,  and  wished  them 
good  speed.  And  when  they  had  sung  their  hymn  to 
ApoUo,  and  finished  their  libations,  they  cast  off  their 
moorings  and  sailed  out  in  line  at  first,  and  then  raced 
each  with  the  other  as  far  as  Angina,  and  so  made 
haste  to  reach  Corcyra,  where  the  rest  of  the  allied 
forces  were  assembling.” — (VI.  30,  32.) 

The  Syracusans  were  for  some  time  imwilling  to 
believe  the  reports  which  reached  them  of  the  sailing 
of  the  expedition.  At  a  general  congress  held  to 
deliberate  on  the  question,  Hermocrates  again  put 
before  his  countrymen  the  imminence  of  the  danger, 
and  the  necessity  for  union  among  themselves.  He  pro¬ 
fessed  to  have  received  accurate  information  of  tlie 
Athenian  movements,  and  had  no  doubt  as  to  their 
real  designs.  They  were  coming,  not  to  aid  their 
allies,  but  to  conquer  Sicily.  He  advised  that  an 
appeal  for  aid  should  be  made  to  the  Greek  towns 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY, 


151? 


on  the  coast  of  Italy,  to  Lacedaemon,  to  Corinth,  and 
even  to  Carthage,  whose  own  interests  might  he  in 
danger,  Above  all,  let  them  man  a  fleet  at  once,  meet' 
the  Athenians  off  Tarentum  on  their  way,  and  dispute 
the  passage  of  the  Gulf. 

This  counsel  was  strongly  opposed  by  Athenagoras, 
the  leader  of  the  democratical  party — the  Cleon  of 
Syracuse.  The  Athenians  would  not  come,  he  said ; 
it  was  only  a  report  spread  by  a  faction  for  their 
own  purposes,  to  raise  themselves  to  power.  If  they 
did  come,  Syracuse  would  prove  more  than  a  match 
for  them :  he  doubted  whether  they  would  even  succeed 
in  effecting  a  landing  on  the  island.  Syracuse  stood 
much  more  in  danger  from  oligarchs  at  home  than 
from  the  Athenians. 

News  reached  Syracuse  at  last  that  the  armada, 
swelled  by  the  junction  of  the  allies  to  a  hundred  and 
thirty  -  four  war  -  galleys,  and  accompanied  by  five 
hundred  smaller  craft,  had  actually  reached  the  coast 
of  Italy,  and  serious  preparations  were  made  for  de¬ 
fence.  The  Athenians  had  already  met  with  some 
discouragement.  The  colonists  at  Rhegium,  on  whose 
aid  they  had  depended,  had  refused  to  join  them ;  and 
it  was  found  that  the  citizens  of  Segest^,  who  had 
offered  to  defray  the  expense  of  the  expedition,  were 
in  no  position  to  do  so.  The  commanders  of  the  force 
were  divided  in  opinion.  Nicias  advised  that  they 
should  confine  their  operations  to  Selinus,  and  then 
return.  Alcibiades  was  for  opening  negotiations  with 
all  the  towns  except  Selinus  and  Syracuse,  and  then, 
in  conjunction  with  such  native  allies  as  they  could 


ICO 


THUCYDIDES. 


thus  obtain,  attacking  Syracuse,  unless  it  would  agree 
to  their  terms.  Lamachus,  with  a  soldier-like  direct¬ 
ness  which  was  in  accordance  with  his  general  char¬ 
acter,  urged  the  bolder  course  of  an  immediate  descent 
on  Syracuse,  while  the  alarm  in  the  city  was  fresh, 
and  before  they  had  time  to  make  preparation  :  a  first 
successful  blow,  he  said,  would  soon  win  them  allies 
in  the  island. 

The  plan  of  Alcibiades  was  adopted ;  but  he  was 
not  to  do  much  himself  towards  carrying  it  out.  A 
state-galley  had  been  sent  out  from  Athens  to  carry 
him  home  as  a  prisoner,  on  a  charge  of  sacrilege.  It 
had  been  hanging  over  his  head  when  the  expedition 
sailed,  and  he  had  asked  to  be  at  once  put  upon  his 
trial.  ■  But  his  enemies  feared  his  popularity  at  the 
moment,  and  hoped  to  complete  their  evidence  against 
him  more  easily  in  his  absence.  The  little  square  stone 
pillars  bearing  the  head  of  Hermes  (Mercury),  the 
genius  of  social  and  political  life,  which  were  set  up  in 
the  street-corners  and  other  places  in  Athens,  were  dis¬ 
covered  to  have  been  all  mutilated  during  one  night. 
The  excitement  at  Athens  was  profound.  It  was,  says 
Grote,  as  though  “  all  the  images  of  the  Virgin  had 
been  defaced  during  the  same  night  in  a  Spanish  or 
Italian  town.”  Rewards  were  offered  for  the  discovery 
of  the  perpetrators,  and  information  was  given  by  slaves 
of  its  having  been  a  drunken  frolic  of  certain  young 
citizens  of  rank,  of  whom  Alcibiades  was  said  to  have 
been  the  ringleader.  He  and  his  friends  were  also 
now  accused  of  having  held  a  mock  celebration  in 
private  houses  of  the  awful  Eleusinian  mysteries. 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


161 


These  acts  were  supposed  to  be  in  some  way  con¬ 
nected  with  a  conspiracy  against  the  democratic  con¬ 
stitution,  though  it  is  not  easy  to  understand  how. 
Alcibiades  was  allowed  to  return  to  Athens  in  his  own 
galley,  to  avoid  the  odium  and  possible  danger  of 
the  public  arrest  of  so  popular  an  officer.  He  landed 
at  Thurii  on  the  way,  gave  his  escort  the  slip,  crossed 
in  a  boat  to  the  Peloponnese,  and  went  straight  to 
Lacedaemon.  Sentence  of  death  was  passed  against 
him  by  default  in  the  Assembly  at  Athens;  but,  in 
recalling  him,  they  had  taken  the  life  out  of  the  expe¬ 
dition;  and  they  left  the  chief  control  of  it  in  the 
hands  of  a  commander  who,  however  high  his  personal 
character,  had  from  the  first  no  sympathy  with  its 
objects,  and  no  faith  in  its  success. 

Hicias  and  Lamachus  now  divided  the  fleet  into 
two  squadrons,  and  undertook  some  operations  against 
a  few  of  the  coast -towns  with  indifferent  success. 
The  Syracusans  grew  bold,  and  determined  on  taking 
the  offensive.  Acting  on  information  from  a  native 
who  was  really  in  the  interest  of  the  Athenians,  they 
marched  out  in  force  to  attack  their  position  at  Catana. 
The  Athenians  meanwhile  re-embarked  their  forces,  set 
sail  by  night,  and,  entering  the  Great  Harbour  of  Syra¬ 
cuse,  effected  a  landing  close  to  the  city  itself,  and  for¬ 
tified  their  position.  They  repulsed  an  attack  made 
on  them  by  the  Syracusans,  inflicting  on  them  con¬ 
siderable  loss.  But  the  enemy  was  too  strong  in 
cavalry  to  allow  them  to  push  their  advantage,  and 
they  withdrew  to  winter  quarters  in  the  harbours  of 
Catana  and  Haxos,  the  only  two  settlements  where 

A.C.S.S.  vol.  vi.  L 


162 


THUCYDIDES. 


they  had  secured  a  favoiirahle  reception.  The  Syra¬ 
cusans  employed  the  interval  in  strengthening  the  de¬ 
fences  of  their  city ;  and  both  parties  sought  alliances 
both  in  the  towns  of  Sicily  and  on  the  Italian  coast. 
In  one  of  these  towns,  Camarina,  the  Athenian  envoy 
was  met  in  the  public  assembly  by  Hermocrates,  who 
had  been  sent  there  on  the  part  of  Syracuse.  The 
latter  urged  his  old  argument,  that  this  was  not  really 
the  cause  of  Syracuse,  but  of  aU  Sicily ;  if  Syracuse 
were  allowed  to  fall,  it  would  be  too  late  for  any  town 
in  the  island  to  resist  the  ambitious  designs  of  Athens. 
The  Athenian  retorts  the  charge  against  Syracuse :  he 
asserts  that  her  object  is  to  make  use  of  others  to 
repel  the  attack  of  Athens,  only  in  order  to  make  her¬ 
self  sovereign  in  the  island  when  the  Athenian  fleet 
was  gone ;  and  he  warns  his  hearers  that  the  ambition 
of  a  neighbour  at  home  was  far  more  to  be  dreaded 
than  that  of  a  foreign  state  beyond  sea. 

The  Syracusans  sent  embassies  also  to  Corinth  and 
to  Sparta.  At  the  latter  place  their  appeal  was  sup¬ 
ported  by  Alcibiades,  now  exasperated  into  bitterness 
against  his  own  city  and  people.  He  is  represented  as 
making  a  clever  speech  there  in  apology  for  his  new 
position ;  but  Thucydides  fails,  as  might  be  expected, 
to  make  out  a  good  case  for  his  renegade  countryman. 
He  makes  Alcibiades  endeavour  to  explain  that  a  demo¬ 
crat  at  Athens  meant  one  who  was  opposed  to  tyrants 
— whom  the  Spartans,  oligarchical  though  their  consti¬ 
tution  was,  held  equally  in  abhorrence.  Besides,  he 
had  been  a  democrat  at  Athens  because  the  constitu¬ 
tion  was  democratic;  though,  he  says,  “all  we  who 


THE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


163 


liave  any  sense  know  what  a  democracy  is,  and  no  one 
better  than  myself,  who  could  find  it  in  my  heart  to 
abuse  it  heartily,  only  that  nothing  new  can  be  said  of 
a  confessed  absurdity.”  In  fact,  he  protests  he  had 
been  banished  from  Athens  because  he  was  not  good 
democrat  enough.  The  real  aim  of  Athens  in  fitting 
out  her  armada  (and  he  spoke,  he  said,  as  one  who 
knew)  was  to  subjugate  Sicily  first,  then  the  Greek 
colonies  on  the  coast  of  Italy,  then  Carthage,  and  then, 
with  a  gathered  force  from  every  quarter,  Greek  and 
barbarian,  to  attempt  the  conquest  of  the  whole  Pelo- 
ponnese.  He  advised  the  Lacedaemonians  by  all  means 
to  send  a  body  of  their  heavy  infantry  to  Sicily,  and 
above  all,  a  Spartan  general  to  organise  the  Syracusan 
forces ;  and  at  the  same  time  to  occupy  Deceleia,  a 
strong  position  fifteen  miles  from  Athens,  whence  its 
communications  and  supplies  could  most  readily  be 
intercepted.  He  concludes  as  follows : — 

“  And  I  claim  that  none  of  you  should  think  the 
worse  of  me  because,  after  having  seemed  hitherto*  a 
lover  of  my  country,  I  now  act  with  all  my  energies 
against  her  in  conjunction  with  her  bitterest  enemies, 
or  distrust  my  suggestions  as  merely  the  zealous  malice 
of  a  banished  man.  I  am  an  exile — true  :  I  have  put 
myself  beyond  the  power  of  their  malice — not  beyond 
the  power  of  aiding  you,  if  you  will  listen  to  me. 
And  a  man’s  worst  enemies  are  not  those  who  attack 
him  in  fair  warfare,  like  you,  but  those  who  compel 
their  friends  to  become  their  enemies.  Loyalty  I  hold 
to  be  really  due,  not  to  the  city  which  treats  me  with 


164 


THUCYDIDES. 


injustice,  but  to  that  in  which  I  once  had  my  consti¬ 
tutional  rights  secured  to  me.  hTor  do  I  count  that 
country  now  my  fatherland  which  I  am  acting  against; 
rather,  I  am  preparing  to  reclaim  a  fatherland  which 
is  mine  no  longer.  The  true  patriot  is  not  he  who 
shrinks  from  attacking  his  native  land  when  he  has 
been  unjustly  driven  from  it,  but  he  who,  out  of  his 
ardent  longing  for  it,  tries  every  means  to  regain  it. 
I  ask  you,  then,  Lacedaemonians,  to  make  use  of  me 
fearlessly,  for  whatever  perilous  service  or  hard  work 
you  will;  remembering  the  argument  so  common  in 
the  mouths  of  all  men,  that  if  I  have  done  you  griev¬ 
ous  harm  as  an  enemy,  I  can  surely  do  you  important 
service  as  a  friend.” — (VI.  92.) 

The  accession  to  the  Lacedaemonian  interests  of 
the  renegade  Athenian  was  of  great  importance  to 
the  result  of  the  struggle.  His  advice  was  at  once 
followed.  A  Spartan  officer,  Gylippus,  was  straight¬ 
way  despatched  to  Syracuse  to  organise  their  army, 
with  promise  of  ships  and  soldiers  to  follow  in  the 
spring.  A  fortress  was  built  on  Deceleia,  and  its 
effects  upon  Athens  were  harassing  in  the  extreme. 
Its  occupation  by  the  enemy  lasted  until  the  termi¬ 
nation  of  the  war,  and  the  people  of  Attica  suffered 
all  the  evils  of  a  perpetual  invasion. 

Early  in  the  following  summer  the  Athenians  had 
got  together  a  tolerably  efficient  cavalry  force,  mounted 
on  native  horses,  which  made  them  more  a  match  for 
their  enemies  in  that  particular  arm ;  and  they  com¬ 
menced  operations  afresh  against  Syracuse.  Their 


TEE  EXPEDITION  TO  SICILY. 


165 


fleet  took  up  a  position  in  the  harbour  of  Thapsus, 
a  small  peninsula,  which  they  fortified  with  a  stockade. 
Above  the  city  of  Syracuse  was  a  steep  range  of  hill 
called  Epipolae  (as  “  overhanging  the  town  ”),  and  of 
this  it  was  necessary  for  the  besiegers  to  get  possession, 
in  order  to  carry  out  their  design  of  building  lines  of 
circumvallation — the  usual  process  in  a  regular  siege- 
while  a  strict  blockade  was  to  be  maintained  by  sea. 
The  Syracusans  were  well  aware  of  the  value  of  this 
position,  and  were  taking  measures  to  secure  it,  when 
the  Athenians  carried  it  by  surprise,  defeating  the 
enemy,  who  hurried  in  disorder  to  defend  it,  with 
considerable  loss.  They  began  their  investing  works 
at  once,  drawing  the  line  across  from  the  Great 
Harbour  to  the  smaller  one  at  Trogilus.  A  cross 
wall,J;o  cut  this  line,  was  commenced  on  the  part  of 
the  enemy ;  it  was  destroyed  by  the  Athenians  :  they 
began  a  second.  In  the  course  of  these  counter-opera¬ 
tions,  attacks  were  made  upon  the  Athenian  lines,  and 
repulsed, — not  without  some  loss  on  their  side,  however. 
In  one  of  these  engagements,  Lamachus,  hurrying  to 
the  support  of  the  right  wing  of  the  Athenians,  which 
had  been  driven  in,  got  too  far  in  advance,  and  was 
cut  olf  with  a  few  of  his  men,  and  killed.  His  body 
was  carried  off  by  the  enemy,  but  restored  after  their 
defeat  under  the  usual  truce.  It  is  disappointing  to 
find  the  death  of  so  gallant  an  officer  related  in  the 
fewest  and  coldest  words.  The  loss  to  the  Athenians 
at  this  juncture  of  a  commander  whose  voice  in  coun¬ 
cil  had  been  given,  as  has  been  seen,  in  favour  of  a 
bolder  course  of  action,  must  have  been  greater  than 


166 


THUCYDIDES. 


tlie  historian  shows.  "We  know  little  of  his  character 
heyond  the  scanty  notices  in  this  history ;  hut  in  the 
hurlesques  of  Aristophanes  he  figures  as  the  rough  hut 
honest  soldier,  of  small  means  and  homely  manners, 
and  a  fair  subject  for  a  joke  on  those  points,  hut  the 
thorough  “  man  of  war  from  his  youth,”  who  braves 
all  hardships,  and  is  never  so  much  at  home  as  when 
in  camp.  Plutarch  strongly  confirms  this  view  of  his 
character. 

The  Athenians  had  now  secured  the  slopes  of  Epi- 
polic,  while  their  fleet  held  possession  of  the  Great 
Harbour.  The  to^vns  on  the  coast,  and  the  native 
tribes  in  the  interior,  began  to  tender  their  allegiance 
to  the  successful  invaders.  The  situation  had  become 
critical  in  the  extreme  for  the  Syracusans ;  and  a  party 
in  the  city  had  even  opened  communications  with 
Hicias  on  the  question  of  surrender.  Hicias  himself 
seems  to  have  lost  his  old  cautious  and  somewhat 
despondent  temperament,  and  to  have  become  con¬ 
fident  and  careless.  He  thought  Syracuse  lay  at 
his  feet. 


CHAPTEE  Xnr. 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 

It  was  about  the  month  of  August  b.c.  414,  when  the 
actual  siege  of  the  city  had  been  going  on  some  five 
months,  that  Gylippus  the  Lacedaemonian  arrived  at 
Syracuse,  with  four  galleys.  After  being  delayed  and 
welhiigh  wrecked  on  his  voyage,  he  had  landed  at  the 
seaport  of  Hun  era,  collected  a  force  of  native  allies, 
and  with  them  marched  across  country,  and  made  his 
appearance  on  the  heights  of  Epipolae  by  some  passes 
left  unguarded  in  the  rear  of  the  Athenian  position. 
He  crossed  their  uncompleted  Ime  of  circumvallation, 
and  entered  the  city,  escorted  by  the  Syi'acusan  army, 
who  had  come  out  to  welcome  him.  By  a  negligence 
on  the  part  of  Hicias  which  seems  unaccountable,  no 
attempt  appears  to  have  been  made  to  check  either 
his  march  through  the  island  or  his  entrance  into 
the  town. 

It  was  only  the  news  of  his  coming,  which  had 
reached  Syracuse  a  few  days  before,  that  saved  it  from 
surrender.  But  from  the  moment  of  his  arrival  the 
confidence  of  the  citizens  was  restored.  It  was  not  so 
much  the  relief  which  he  brought  or  promised,  as  the 


1G8 


THUCYDIDES. 


personal  weight  of  the  man,  which  gave  them  new 
spirit.  He  began  by  sending  a  herald  to  the  Athe¬ 
nians  to  say  that  “  he  was  prepared  to  make  terms 
with  them,  if  they  were  willing  to  quit  Sicily  within 
'  five  days  wdth  all  their  belongings.”  We  are  not.sur 
prised  to  read  that  to  such  a  proposal  they  vouchsafed 
no  reply.  But  we  imaguie  also  its  effect  on  the  Syra¬ 
cusans,  to  whom  the  warlike  reputation  of  the  Spartans 
was  well  knov7n.  He  next  captured  a  fort  which  the 
Athenians  had  occupied,  and  put  the  garrison  to  the 
sword.  But  perhaps  the  point  in  his  behaviour  most 
calculated  to  instil  respect  and  confidence  in  his  new 
allies  was,  that  when  he  was  defeated  in  an  action 
which  took  place  between  the  works  and  counter¬ 
works,  he  had  the  courage  to  tell  the  SjTacusans  that 
“  the  fault  was  not  theirs  but  his  own,  for  having  lost 
the  advantage  of  the  cavalry  and  javelin -men,  by 
hampering  himself  too  much  between  walls;  but  he 
would  lead  them  to  the  attack  again.”  They  were 
Dorians,  all  of  them,  he  said,  and  were  not  going  to 
be  beaten,  surely,  by  those  lonians,  and  islanders,  and 
mixed  rabble  of  all  sorts.  And  in  the  next  battle  he 
drove  the  Athenians  within  their  lines,  carried  out  the 
new  counter-wall  of  defence  beyond  their  works,  and 
prevented  them  from  ever  completing  their  intended 
line  of  circumvallation. 

Both  sides  stood  in  need  of  reinforcements.  The 
Syi'acusans  sent  a  further  appeal  for  aid  to  Corinth  and 
Lacedaemon ;  and  Gylippus  went  in  person  through 
the  towns  of  Sicily  collecting  such  auxiliaries,  raAcI 
and  military,  as  he  could.  Nicias  had  fullon  back 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE, 

into  his  old  despondency — indeed  he  had  now  perhaps 
sufficient  cause — and  he  despatched  a  pitiable  letter 
(which  Thucydides  probably  gives  verbatim  from 
some  public  record)  to  the  home  authorities.  The 
arrival  of  Gylippus,  he  said,  had  completely  changed 
the  situation.  The  Syracusans  would  soon  be 
strongly  reinforced.  His  army  were  obliged  to  give 
up  their  own  works  of  circumvallation,  and  had  be¬ 
come  rather  the  besieged  than  the  besiegers.  Their 
ships  were  leaky,  their  crews  daily  diminishing  — 
some  even  deserting.  The  expedition  must  either  be 
recalled  at  once,  or  strongly  reinforced.  He  himself 
was  suffering  from  illness,  and  begged  to  be  relieved 
of  his  command.  There  is  much  honest  pathos,  if 
some  lack  of  dignity,  in  his  personal  appeal :  “I  think 
I  have  a  right  to  claim  this  indulgence  from  you,  for, 
so  long  as  I  had  my  health,  I  did  you  much  good  ser¬ 
vice  in  my  command.” 

Either  the  Athenians  had  immense  confidence  in  the 
high  character  of  their  general,  or  they  must  have 
concluded  that  his  letter  expressed  only  the  natural 
dejection  of  ill  health,  and  unwillingness  to  incur 
responsibilities.  They  refused  to  supersede  him ;  but 
they  associated  two  of  his  officers  with  him  in  the 
command,  until  Demosthenes  and  Eurymedon,  who 
were  to  be  sent  out  as  soon  as  possible  with  new 
forces,  should  arrive  at  Syracuse.  The  latter  officer 
(of  Corcyraean  notoriety)  was  despatched  at  once, 
though  it  was  the  middle  of  winter,  with  ten  galleys 
and  a  supply  of  money. 

But  the  Syracusans  received  their  reinforcements 


170 


THUCYDIDES. 


first — a  picked  "body  of  armed  Helots  from  Lacedso 
mon,  and  infantry  from  Boeotia,  Corintli,  and  Sicyon. 
Gylippns,  too,  had  returned  to  the  city  'with  what 
native  auxiliaries  he  had  been  able  to  raise ;  and  he 
now  proceeded  to  adopt  new  and  holder  tactics.  All 
through  the  winter  a  Syracusan  fleet  had  been  care¬ 
fully  manned  and  regularly  exercised  ;  and  he  pro¬ 
posed  at  once  to  attack  the  Athenians  where  they  had 
liitherto  been  supposed  incontestably  superior — by  sea. 
In  this  he  was  ably  seconded  by  Hermocrates,  who 
maintained  that  this  superiority  rested  on  mere  reputa¬ 
tion,  and,  such  as  it  was,  had  been  but  the  result  of 
circumstances  which  had  compelled  Athens  to  become 
a  naval  power  instead  of  an  inland  one.  The  first 
attempt,  however,  resulted  in  a  complete  defeat  of  the 
new  fleet  in  their  attack  on  the  Athenians  in  the 
Great  Harbour;  but  in  a  simultaneous  assault  made 
by  Gylippus  by  land  upon  the  Athenian  forts  on 
Plemmyrium,  he  succeeded  in  driving  them  from  that 
important  position  with  considerable  loss,  and  to  their 
serious  distress  for  the  future,  as  it  gave  the  Syracusans 
the  command  of  the  entrance  of  the  harbour,  and  no 
supplies  could  now  come  in  to  the  Athenians  with¬ 
out  a  battle. 

Hothing  discouraged  by  their  first  defeat,  the  Syra¬ 
cusans  prepared  for  a  second  trial  of  strength  by  sea. 
They  knew  that  in  the  confined  space  within  the  hai- 
bour  the  usual  Athenian  tactics  of  sweeping  round 
with  their  light  and  swift  galleys  and  perfectly-trained 
oarsmen,  and  ramming  the  enemy  on  the  broadside, 
could  not  well  be  carried  out ;  and,  acting  under  the 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


171 


advice  of  a  clever  Corinthian,  they  strengthened  the 
beaks  of  their  own  heavier  vessels  with  under-heams, 
so  as  to  give  them  the  advantage  in  a  direct  charge, 
how  to  bow.  The  first  day’s  engagement  was  inde¬ 
cisive  ;  but  the  Syracusans  renewed  the  action  after  a 
day’s  interval,  and  gained  a  complete  victory,  sinking 
seven  Athenian  galleys,  disabling  many  more,  and 
inflicting  on  them  very  considerable  loss  in  men  killed 
and  prisoners.  The  spirits  of  the  besieged  were  raised 
to  the  highest  point :  they  were  confident  that  they 
had  now  established  their  superiority  at  sea,  and  they 
had  little  doubt  of  the  result  of  future  operations  by 
land.  The  discouragement  of  the  besiegers  was  pro¬ 
portionate,  and  their  fortunes  from  that  time  practically 
hopeless. 

Yet  for  the  moment  their  hopes  revived,  when,  a 
day  or  two  after  the  battle,  Demosthenes  and  Eury- 
medon  (who  had  returned  to  meet  his  fellow-admiral) 
arrived  from  Athens  with  the  expected  reinforcements. 
It  was  an  imposing  force  which  entered  the  harbour 
— almost  a  second  armada — seventy-three  war-galleys, 
five  thousand  heavy  infantry,  with  light  troops  of 
various  nationalities  in  full  proportion.  Even  the 
Syracusans  were  struck  with  a  new  dismay  at  this 
addition  to  the  strength  of  the  enemy.  And  Demos¬ 
thenes  determined  at  least  not  to  imitate  “  the  policy 
of  Hicias,  whose  force  had  been  so  formidable  on  his 
first  arrival,  but  who  had  allowed  it  to  fall  into  con¬ 
tempt  by  wasting  the  winter  at  Catana,  instead  of 
attacking  Syracuse  at  once.”  *  He  saw  that  the  one 


* 


VII.  42. 


172 


THUCYDIDES. 


object,  if  the  siege  was  to  be  carried  to  any  successful 
issue,  must  be  to  capture  and  destroy  the  enemy’s 
cm  nter-work  on  Epipolse.  His  attempts  to  take  it  by 
direct  assault  failed  ;  and  he  then  resolved  upon  a 
night  attack  in  strong  force  by  a  circuitous  route  in  its 
rear.  The  most  difficult  part  of  the  enterprise  had 
apparently  succeeded ;  but  then  the  troops  seem  to 
have  lost  their  order  and  got  into  confusion :  the  battle- 
cries,  where  Greeks  met  Greeks,  were  not  to  be  distin¬ 
guished,  and  in  the  darkness  and  uproar  friends  were 
confounded  with  foes.  The  author  honestly  admits 
that  he  had  been  unable  to  gain  from  the  actors  on 
either  side  any  clear  account  of  the  action ;  but  in  the 
end  the  Athenians  were  driven  back  down  the  hill. 
Many  were  forced  over  the  cliffs,  and  many  lost  their 
way  after  the  descent,  and  were  cut  off  by  the  enemy’s 
cavalry.  The  defeat  was  decisive,  and  thenceforth  the 
Syracusans  assumed  the  aggressive,  and  it  became  only 
a  question  of  the  Athenians  holding  their  own. 

A  council  of  war  was  held,  and  Demosthenes  urged 
a  retreat  while  their  fleet  were  yet  masters  of  the  seas ; 
and  in  this  he  was  supported  by  Eurymedon.  Hicias 
opposed  it;  he  was  afraid  of  dispiriting  his  men; 
and  he  thought  he  had  friends  in  the  city  who  would 
yet  arrange  for  its  surrender.  He  did  not  urge  these 
reasons  publicly  in  the  council.  He  argued  that  the 
Athenians  would  never  forgive  a  retreat  without  orders 
from  home.  “  He  had  no  wish  himself,  knowing  well, 
as  he  did,  the  temper  of  the  Athenians,  to  die  an  un¬ 
just  death  at  the  hands  of  his  countrymen  on  a  charge 
of  dishonour :  he  preferred  to  risk  his  fate,  if  so  it 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


173 


must  bcj  at  the  hands  of  the  enemy,  so  far  as  he  was 
concerned.”  *  The  resources  of  Syracuse,  he  was  as¬ 
sured  from  private  information,  were  all  but  exhausted; 
and  he  maintained  that  they  must  carry  on  the  siege. 

In  divided  counsels  there  is  no  safety.  Demos¬ 
thenes  and  Eurymedon  unwillingly  gave  way;  the 
Syracusans  received  reinforcements  both  from  the 
island  and  from  the  Peloponnese ;  and  then,  too  late, 
Nicias  ceased  to  oppose  a  general  retreat.  Secret 
orders  were  issued  for  the  departure  of  the  fleet ;  but 
an  eclipse  of  the  moon  intervened,  and  Nicias — “for 
he  was  much  given  to  superstitious  scruples  and  such- 
hke — declared  that  he  would  not  now  even  discuss  the 
question  as  to  making  any  movement  before  they  had 
waited  thrice  nine  days,  as  the  soothsayers  enjoined.” 

The  Syracusans  had  gained  intelligence  of  the  con¬ 
templated  retreat,  and  at  once  made  a  combined  attack 
on  their  enemies  by  land  and  sea.  Their  first  attempt 
to  storm  the  Athenian  lines  was  not  successful;  but 
they  completely  defeated  the  Athenian  fleet  in  the  har¬ 
bour,  capturing  eighteen  of  their  galleys  and  killing  all 
their  crews.  Eurymedon  was  among  the  slain.  They 
were  resolved  to  complete  the  destruction  of  their 
whole  armament.  With  this  view,  they  began  to  block 
up  the  mouth  of  the  harbour  with  a  close-packed  line 
of  merchant-vessels,  while  they  prepared  for  another 
attack  on  the  fleet  within.  The  only  hope  for  the 
Athenians  now  was  to  force  the  passage.  hTicias 
addressed  his  crews,  and  again  the  captains  individ¬ 
ually,  reminding  them  that  not  only  their  own  lives. 


*  VII.  48. 


174 


THUCYDIDES. 


but  the  fortunes  of  Athens,  hung  on  the  coming  battle. 
Gylippus,  on  liis  part,  called  on  the  Syracusans  to  fight 
now,  not  only  for  the  liberties  of  Sicily,  but  for  ven¬ 
geance  on  the  invader. 

Nicias  gave  the  command  of  the  fleet  to  Demos¬ 
thenes,  himself  remaining  at  the  head  of  the  troops  on 
shore.  The  fight  in  the  harbour  was  long  and  obsti¬ 
nate.  There  were  nearly  two  hundred  galleys  engaged 
in  close  action,  and  above  half  of  them  were  left  mere 
wrecks ;  but  the  result  was  another  decisive  victory  for 
the  Syracusans.  The  Athenians  had  provided  grap¬ 
pling-irons,  by  means  of  which  they  laid  their  own 
galleys  aboard  the  enemy’s,  and  reduced  the  struggle 
to  a  combat  hand-to-hand.  But  it  may  well  be  doubted 
whether  this  was  not  in  their  enemy’s  favour,  as  they 
would  thus  lose  aU  the  advantage  of  their  own  nautical 
skill.  The  historian  has  given  a  description  of  the 
battle  at  greater  length  and  with  more  picturesque  de¬ 
tail  than  is  usual  with  him.  The  struggle  took  place 
in  full  view  of  the  troops  on  both  sides,  who  lined  the 
shores  of  the  harbour,  and  their  interest  in  it  is  vividly 
described.  It  is  possible  that  the  writer  was  himself  a 
spectator : — 

“The. troops  on  either  side  who  looked  on  from 
shore,  while  the  sea-fight  was  thus  equally  balanced, 
shared  largely,  so  far  as  their  feelings  were  concerned, 
in  the  struggle  and  the  conflict ;  the  native  forces  eager 
now  for  increase  of  glory,  the  invaders  dreading  lest 
they  slioidd  meet  with  a  worse  disaster  than  they  had 
already.  .  .  .  When  any  of  them  saw  their  own 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


17i 


men  victorious  in  any  quarter,  they  were  of  good  cheer, 
and  fell  to  invoking  heaven  not  to  disappoint  them  of 
success ;  while  those  who  beheld  their  friends  getting 
the  worst  of  it  mingled  their  shouts  with  lamentations, 
and,  because  they  could  see  aU  that  happened,  were 
more  depressed  in  spirit  than  those  actually  engaged. 
Others,  who  had  a  view  of  some  hardly-contested  scene 
of  the  fight,  went  through  the  greatest  distress,  owing 
to  the  prolonged  suspense  of  the  struggle,  and  in  their 
extreme  anxiety  made  contortions  of  their  bodies  corre¬ 
sponding  to  their  feelings, — for  they  were  always  within 
a  little,  as  it  seemed,  either  of  escape  or  destruction.  So, 
in  that  one  and  the  same  body  of  Athenians,  so  long  as 
the  fight  at  sea  was  equally  balanced,  might  be  heard 
all  at  once  loud  lamentations  and  shouts  of  triumph — 
‘  They  are  winning !  ’  ‘  They  are  beaten  !  ’ — and  all  the 
varied  utterances  which  would  be  forced  from  a  great 
army  under  great  peril.” — (YII.  71.) 

So  utterly  overwhelmed  and  demoralised  were  the 
Athenians  by  this  last  defeat,  that  they  had  thought 
of  retreating  by  night,  without  even  asking  the  usual 
permission  to  bury  their  dead.  Demosthenes,  indeed, 
would  have  made  one  more  attempt  to  force  the  pas¬ 
sage  out  next  morning  with  the  remaining  ships ;  but 
the  men  would  not  hear  of  it. 

They  began  their  retreat  by  land,  40,000  men  who 
were  in  a  condition  to  march;  leaving  their  dead, 
their  sick,  and  their  wounded  behind,  burning  such 
of  their  galleys  as  they  could,  and  abandoning  the 
remainder  to  the  Syincusans.  “The  account  of  the 


176 


THUCYDIDES. 


retreat,”  says  Macaulay,  “is  among  narratives  tv  hat 
Vandyck’s  Lord  Strafford  is  among  paintings.” 

“A  terrible  scene  it  was,  not  only  from  tbe  one 
great  fact  that  they  were  going  off  with  the  sacrifice 
of  all  their  ships,  and,  instead  of  all  their  high  hopes, 
in  imminent  peril  for  themselves  and  for  their  country; 
but  in  the  act  of  breaking  up  their  quarters  there  oc¬ 
curred  circumstances  grievous  alike  to  their  sight  and 
their  feelings  individually.  For  they  were  leaving 
their  dead  unburied,  and  when  any  man  saw  one  of 
his  personal  friends  lying  among  them,  he  was  seized 
at  once  with  grief  and  with  dread :  while  those  who 
were  being  left  behind  alive,  wounded  or  sick,  were  a 
far  sadder  sight  than  even  the  dead  for  the  living  to 
look  upon,  and  more  to  be  pitied  than  those  who  had 
been  slain.  For  these,  breaking  out  into  entreaties 
and  lamentations,  drove  their  friends  almost  to  distrac¬ 
tion  by  conjuring  them  to  take  them  with  them ;  ap¬ 
pealing  to  each  one  by  name,  if  they  caught  sight  of  a 
friend  or  a  relative,  hanging  on  their  mess-comrades  as 
they  were  moving  off,  and  following  them  as  far  as  they 
could ;  and  when  their  strength  or  their  limbs  failed, 
not  resigning  themselves  to  being  left  behind  without 
repeated  adjurations  and  many  groans.  So  that  the 
whole  force,  reduced  to  weeping  and  in  this  sore  dis¬ 
traction,  had  much  work  to  get  away  at  all,  though 
they  were  quitting  an  enemy’s  country,  after  sufferings 
too  great  for  tears,  and  in  dread  of  suffering  yet  more 
in  the  unseen  future.  Great,  too,  was  the  general  de¬ 
jection  and  lack  of  confidence  in  themselves ;  for  they 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


177 


resembled  nothing  so  much  as  the  population  of  a  city 
that  has  been  starved  out  and  has  to  be  evacuated. 
.  .  .  It  was  the  heaviest  reverse  that  had  ever  hap¬ 
pened  to  a  Greek  army :  it  had  fallen  to  men  who  came 
to  make  slaves  of  others  to  have  to  retreat  for  fear  lest 
such  lot  should  rather  be  their  own.  Instead  of  tho 
prayers  and  hymns  of  triumph  with  which  they  had 
set  sail,  they  had  now  to  leave  their  quarters  under 
omens  the  very  reverse,  moving  by  land  instead  of  by 
8ea,  and  having  to  trust  to  their  arms  and  not  their 
ships.  Yet  still,  in  view  of  the  magnitude  of  the  peril 
which  yet  hung  over  them,  all  this  seemed  to  them 
endurable  enough.” — ^YII.  75.) 

Nicias  made  his  last  address  to  his  broken  force,  a.s 
he  passed  along  their  lines,  in  a  firm  voice,  and  as 
cheerfully  as  he  might.  He  bade  them  hope  stiU,  and, 
above  all  things,  not  lose  their  self-respect. 

“  For  my  own  part — there  is  no  one  of  you  who  is 
not  at  least  as  strong  as  I  am  (you  can  see  to  what  a 
state  I  am  reduced  by  disease),  and  though  I  have  as 
much  to  make  life  valuable  to  me,  privately  and  pub¬ 
licly,  as  any  man,  yet  here  I  am,  exposed  to  the  same 
danger  as  the  meanest  soldier ;  yet  I  have  done  much 
to  live  a  god-fearing  life,  and  to  act  justly  and  be  with¬ 
out  reproach  among  men.  And  therefore  have  I  yet 
confident  hope  for  the  future,  and  these  misfortunes  do 
not  appal  me  so  much  as  they  well  might.  .  .  . 

Look,  too,  what  stout  soldiers,  and  in  what  goodly 
numbers,  inarch  in  yoiu*  ranks,  and  be  not  too  much 

A.C.S.S.  vol.  vi. 


M 


178 


THUCYDIDES. 


disheartened  :  remember  that  wherever  you  take  up 
your  quarters,  you  will  virtually  form  a  city  of  your¬ 
selves,  and  that  there  is  no  place  in  Sicily  that  can 
either  withstand  your  attack,  or  drive  you  out  if  once 
you  occupy  it.  Take  only  good  heed  yourselves  that 
your  march  be  safe  and  orderly,  each  man  reflecting 
that  in  the  spot  for  which  he  may  be  forced  to  fight, 
he  will  find,  if  he  is  victorious,  both  a  city  and  a 
fortress.  .  .  . 

“  In  brief,  fellow-soldiers,  make  up  your  minds  that 
you  must  needs  put  forth  ah.  your  valour,  since  there  is 
no  refuge  at  hand  to  which  you  can  escape  if  you  turn 
cowards;  while,  if  you  now  deliver  yourselves  from 
your  enemies,  all  will  regain  the  homes  I  know  you 
long  to  see,  and  we  Athenians  shall  build  up  again  the 
mighty  power  of  our  native  state,  fallen  though  it 
may  be  now;  for  it  is  men  that  make  a  state,  and 
not  stone  walls  or  empty  galleys.” — (VII.  77.) 

The  retreating  army  marched  in  a  kind  of  hollow 
square,  the  camp-followers  and  baggage  inside,  harassed 
at  every  step  by  the  enemy’s  horse,  and  galled  by  their 
archers.  The  first  day  they  did  not  make  five  miles. 
The  Syracusans  had  occupied  beforehand  the  fords  and 
passes.  The  Athenians  gained  some  little  ground  by  a 
stolen  march  the  second  night ;  but  by  the  next  mid¬ 
day  the  rear-guard  under  Demosthenes  found  them¬ 
selves  surrounded  in  an  olive  plantation,  and  laid  down 
their  arms  on  the  promise  that  their  lives  should  be 
spared.  Hicias,  with  the  advance,  struggled  on  some 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


179 


distance  further,  till  they  reached  the  little  fiver 
Asinarius.  There,  rushing  into  the  stream  to  quench 
their  burning  thirst,  they  fell  into  irretrievable  confu¬ 
sion,  and  were  butchered  by  thousands  with  scarcely 
an  attempt  at  resistance.  Nicias  at  length  surrendered 
to  Gylippus  in  person.  Of  the  troops,  some  few  made 
their  escape  and  reached  the  friendly  walls  of  Catana ; 
some  were  carried  off  and  made  slaves  by  their  in¬ 
dividual  captors;  7000  were  carried  to  Syracuse  as 
public  spoil,  and  after  a  miserable  imprisonment  of 
about  two  months  in  the  great  stone-quarries  there, 
exposed  without  shelter  of  any  kind  to  burning  sun 
and  heavy  rains,  were  sold  as  slaves :  the  Athenians 
and  Sicilian  Greeks  were  kept  there  some  time  longer. 

The  fate  of  the  two  commanders  was  a  subject  of 
some  discussion.  Gylippus  would  have  carried  them 
home  with  him  in  triumph  to  Lacedaemon.  But  the 
Syracusans  would  not  even  show  this  questionable 
mercy :  they  insisted  on  putting  both  to  death.  Thucy¬ 
dides  thinks  that  the  influential  parties  within  the 
walls,  who  had  been  in  communication  with  hTicias, 
feared  that  he  might  betray  their  secrets.  The  his¬ 
torian  gives  him  a  brief  and  cold  epitaph.  “  He  least 
of  all  the  Greeks  of  my  time  deserved  such  a  miserable 
fate,  because  of  his  consistent  practice  of  every  recog¬ 
nised  moral  virtue.”  *  Yet  it  was  better  for  him,  per- 

*  Tliere  is  another  reading  of  the  passage, — “consistent  dis¬ 
charge  of  all  religious  duties ;  ”  on  'which  Mr  Grote  has  founded 
a  sneering  depreciation  of  Nicias  as  “such  a  respectable  and 
religious  in  an  !  ” — (Hist,  of  Greece,  V.  308.) 


180 


THUCYDIDES, 


haps,  than  a  return  to  Athens  Avith  the  broken  remains 
of  that  grand  armament,  to  the  failure  of  Avhich  his 
own  incompetence  had  so  largely  contributed. 

Great  was  the  consternation  at  Athens,  when  by 
slow  degrees  the  whole  terrible  truth  began  to  be  re¬ 
alised.  They  knew  the  fuE  extent  of  their  danger. 
The  Syracusans  might  sad  to  the  Piraeus;  their  enemies 
at  home  would  gather  courage ;  the  subject-islanders 
would  seize  the  opportunity  to  revolt.  But  they  no 
more  lost  heart  than  the  Eomans  after  Cannae.  They 
built  a  new  fleet,  and  retrenched  their  expenses.  The 
reserve  of  a  thousand  talents  (some  X240,000),  which 
the  foresight  of  Pericles  had  set  aside  at  the  commence¬ 
ment  of  the  war  for  any  season  of  emergency,  was  noAV 
called  into  use.  But  though  Athens  rallied  thus 'gal¬ 
lantly,  and  maintained  the  struggle  with  varying  suc¬ 
cess  for  eight  3  ears  longer,  she  never  fully  recovered 
the  blow  which  had  been  struck  in  Sicily.  She  had 
found  her  Moscoav,  says  Thirlwall,  in  Syracuse. 

And  here,  if  completeness  Avere  desired,  the  history 
of  Thucydides  should  conclude.  The  events  chronicled 
in  his  eighth  and  last  “  book  ”  (Avliich  he  never  fin¬ 
ished)  are  of  inferior  interest  to  the  Sicilian  disaster, 
and  were  only  preparatory  to  the  end.  The  anticipated 
revolt  amongst  the  subject-allies  of  Athens  soon  began. 
The  important  island  of  Chios  was  the  first  to  tlirow 
off  its  allegiance,  supported  by  a  Peloponnesian  fleet ; 
the  Ionian  tovnu  of  Miletus  followed,  and  the  islands 
of  Teos,  Lesbos,  Ehodes,  and  later  on,  Euboea.  An 
alliance  was  concluded  for  the  first  time  between  the 
Lacedaemonians  and  the  court  of  Persia,  from  which, 


THE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


181 


however,  they  reaped  no  material  benefit ;  for  the  king 
had  his  own  interests  chiefly  in  view,  and  Tissaphernes, 
the  satrap  who  managed  Persian  affairs  in  those  quar¬ 
ters,  speedily  disagreed  with  his  new  friends. 

The  intrigues  of  Alcibiades,  restless  in  his  exile, 
mistrusted  by  the  Spartans  in  spite  of  all  his  ability, 
contributed  largely  to  the  quarrel.  He  was  endeavour- 
ing  to  bring  about  his  own  restoration  to  Athens  under 
a  change  of  government.  “  He  had  taken  measures,” 
Bays  Thucydides,  “through  some  powerful  friends,  to 
have  it  mentioned  in  good  society  that  he  should  be 
glad  to  come  back — but  under  an  oligarchy,  not  under 
the  rascal  democracy  who  had  driven  him  out — and  to 
resume  his  position  as  a  citizen,  after  giving  them  Tis¬ 
saphernes  for  a  friend.”  The  plot  was  first  concocted 
in  the  Athenian  camp  at  Samos,  and  the  temptation  of 
making  an  ally  of  the  Great  King,  who  could  have  no 
possible  dealings  with  a  democracy,  and  whose  pecu¬ 
niary  aid  would  be  so  valuable,  proved  strong  enough, 
combined  with  the  influence  of  the  oligarchical  clubs, 
to  effect  a  revolution  at  Athens.  The  old  democratic  con 
stitution — it  had  existed,  the  author  remarks,  a  hun¬ 
dred  years  exactly — was  overthrown,  and  an  oligarchy 
of  Four  Hundred  seized  the  government.  Among  the 
leaders  of  this  movement  was  Antiphon  the  rhetori¬ 
cian,  said  to  have  been  Thucydides’s  teacher.  But  it 
was  not  by  this  party,  after  all,  that  Alcibiades  was 
recalled.  They  found  that  he  did  not  possess  the  in¬ 
fluence  of  which  he  had  boasted  with  the  Persian ; 
and  they  suspected,  not  unjustly,  that  he  was  at  heart 
no  true  partisan  of  any  cause  but  his  own  private  in- 


182 


THUCYDIDES. 


terests.  The  army  and  the  fleet  had  continued  stanch 
to  the  cause  of  democracy,  and  swore  at  Samos  a  sol¬ 
emn  oath  to  maintain  it.  Generals  were  elected  I’y 
public  vote,  in  whom  they  could  have  full  confidence. 
“We  must  not  lose  heart,”  said  one  of  them,  Thrasy- 
bulus,  “because  the  city  has  revolted  from  us.”  But 
the  strangest  circumstance  was,  that  Alcibiades  gave  in 
his  adhesion  to  them,  and  was  taken  into  their  confi¬ 
dence.  He  was  restored  to  his  country  by  the  formal 
vote  of  a  self-constituted  Assembly  held  by  the  troops 
at  Samos ;  for  they  regarded  Athens,  under  her  new 
oligarchical  rulers,  as  no  longer  the  seat  of  any  lawful 
authority.  Within  a  few  months  the  government  of 
the  Four  Hundred  was  overthrown  there,  and  the 
democracy  in  all  essentials  restored.  Antiphon  and 
others  of  his  fellow  -  revolutionists  were  brought  to 
trial,  and  condemned,  in  accordance  with  the  Athenian 
law  of  treason,  to  drink  the  hemlock-juice.  A  Lacedae¬ 
monian  fleet  with  which,  as  Thucydides  admits,  An¬ 
tiphon  and  his  party  had  held  treasonable  communi¬ 
cations,  was  hovering  off  the  Piraeus ;  and  had  .they 
known  how  to  use  their  opportunity,  the  fall  of 
Athens  might  have  taken  place  six  years  earlier  than 
it  did. 

Bestored  to  all  his  rights,  Alcibiades  was  at  once 
elected  one  of  the  Athenian  generals.  He  did  not 
revisit  his  native  city  for  some  years ;  but  under  his 
leading,  and  that  of  Thrasybulus  and  Thiu-syllus,  the 
Athenian  fleet  won  a  victory  at  Kynos-sCma  on  the 
Hellespont,  over  the  Peloponnesian  confederates,  in¬ 
cluding  a  squadron  from  their  old  enemy  Syracuse 


TEE  DISASTER  AT  SYRACUSE. 


183 


(b.c.  411).  It  was  a  success  not  so  decisive  or  import¬ 
ant  in  itself,  as  in  the  effect  it  had  for  the  time  on  the 
drooping  spirit  of  Athens.  With  this  event,  in  the 
twenty-first  year  of  the  war,  the  author’s  unfinished 
history  concludes. 


More  than  once  before  the  war  was  ended,  Athens 
had  her  gleams  of  triumph  and  her  chances  of  at  least 
an  honourable  peace.  When  the  Lacedtemonian  admi¬ 
ral,  Mindarus,  was  killed,  and  his  whole  fleet  captured, 
in  the  fight  at  Cyzicus,  negotiations  were  proposed 
by  the  enemy,  and  in  the  flush  of  triumph  refused. 
Overtures  are  said  to  have  been  again  made  by  Lace¬ 
daemon  after  the  second  great  naval  victory  of  the 
Athenians  at  the  Arginusae  islands,  and  to  have  been 
in  like  manner  rejected.  But  the  tide  of  success  soon 
turned.  Athens  dismissed  from  his  command,  and 
drove  again  into  exile,  the  man  whom,  with  all  his 
faults,  she  could  least  spare  at  this  juncture — Alci- 
biades.  He  had  not  always  been  successful :  he  had 
still  hitter  personal  enemies,  and  his  relations  with  the 
Persian  satraps  were  a  continual  ground  of  suspicion. 
She  adjudged  to  death,  for  what  was  at  worst  hut  an 
error  of  judgment,  the  commanders  who  had  con¬ 
quered  for  her  at  Arginusae ;  and  she  was  worse  served 
hy  those  who  (in  spite  of  the  generous  warning  of 
the  exiled  Alcihiades  against  the  insecurity  of  the 
station)  lost  her  navy  in  the  crowning  disaster  at  the 
Goats’  River  (Aigos-potami).  She  had  to  surrender  to 


184 


THUCYDIDES. 


Lysander  on  almost  his  own  terms;  and  while  her 
bitterest  enemies  looked  on,  crowned  with  garlands  as 
at  a  holiday,  her  Long  Walls,  her  pride  and  defence, 
were  pulled  down  to  the  somid  of  the  Lacedaemonian 
fifes.  It  was  only  the  forbearance  of  her  great  rival 
that  prevented  her  utter  obliteration  as  a  power  in 
Greece. 


CHAPTER  XV. 


CONCLUDING  REMARKS. 

Closely  as  Thucydides  may  he  said  to  have  approached 
to  the  spirit  of  modern  history,  there  are  points  where 
the  difference  strikes  the  reader  forcibly  enough.  He 
scarcely  ever  vouchsafes  us  even  a  glimpse  of  the 
Athens  or  Sparta  of  his  day,  except  so  far  as  their 
foreign  politics  are  concerned — that  is,  their  relations 
with  each  other  and  the  neighbouring  states  in  the 
way  of  treaties  and  alliances,  in  operations  by  land 
and  sea,  in  the  struggle  for  dominion  and  the  re¬ 
sistance  it  entails.  We  see  nothing  of  the  great 
Pericles  except  as  the  leading  spirit  of  the  war, — the 
commander  of  the  Athenian  forces,  or  the  orator  who 
defends  its  policy.  Of  the  internal  state  of  Athens 
we  gain  from  his  history  no  information  at  all.  The 
description  of  the  great  pestilence  might  be  taken  as 
an  exception,  but  that  he  plainly  regards  it  chiefly  as 
an  important  episode  in  the  war.  We  should  have 
known  nothing  from  his  pages  of  the  influence  over 
the  Athenian  commons  of  men  like  Cleon,  if  the  cap¬ 
ture  of  Sphakteria  and  the  fate  of  the  Mityleneans 
had  not  brought  this  influence  into  the  foreground. 

Yet  perhaps  even  what  we  are  inclined  to  notice  aa 


186 


THUCYDIDES. 


a  defect  may  be  tbe  consistency  of  art,  which  is  not 
nnfrequently  too  cold  and  severe  for  popular  criticism. 
Thucydides  set  out  by  professing  himself  the  historian 
of  the  war  between  the  confederacies  of  Athens  and 
Sparta,  and  he  has  confined  himself  to  his  subject 
with  a  unity  of  purpose,  and  perhaps  some  amount  of 
self-denial,  which  has  not  always  been  appreciated.  It 
is  true  that  we  learn  from  him  nothing  of  the  social 
and  domestic  life  of  his  countrymen  at  a  most  in¬ 
teresting  period :  we  gain  more  real  information  on 
this  point  from  the  burlesques  of  Aristophanes  or 
the  Dialogues  of  Plato.  On  the  art,  the  science,  the 
literature  of  the  times,  he  is  absolutely  silent.  He  has 
no  ‘‘supplementary  chapters”  on  these  subjects,  like 
his  modern  successors,  in  which  the  progress  and  de¬ 
velopment  of  a  nation  in  these  respects  is  kept  on 
parallel  lines,  as  it  were,  with  its  growth  or  decadence 
in  strength,  in  territory,  in  the  achievements  of  war. 
The  only  poet  he  quotes  is  Homer,  and  then  rather  as 
historian  than  as  bard ;  we  should  not  know  from  his 
pages  that  the  drama,  then  in  its  highest  development, 
was  a  main  feature  in  Athenian  life  :  he  mentions  the 
noblest  work  of  Pheidias — the  statue  of  Athen^  in  the 
Parthenon — only  to  calculate  the  amount  of  gold  on  it 
which  Pericles  thought  might  be  available  in  a  national 
emergency.*  Much  as  we  may  regret  these  omissions, 
the  historian  would  perhaps  have  defended  them,  a-s 
being  outside  the  subject  he  had  proposed  to  himself 
and  to  his  readers :  he  had  promised  us  not  a  history 
of  Athens,  but  a  history  of  the  war. 

The  same  explanation  may  not  unfairly  be  suggested 

*  II.  13. 


CONCLUDING  REMARKS. 


187 


of  a  charge  which  has  been  brought  against  him  of  an 
apparent  indifference  to  human  suffering.  The  cold¬ 
blooded  massacres  perpetrated  by  both  parties  in  this 
war  are  related  by  him  without  any  attempt  at  pallia¬ 
tion,  and  at  the  same  time  without  any  expression  of 
horror.  Even  the  sufferings  of  the  Athenian  citizens 
after  the  great  disaster  in  Sicily  do  not  affect  the  calm 
current  of  his  narrative :  and  he  leaves  the  wretched 
captives  in  the  Syracusan  stone-quarries  without  even 
satisfying  the  reader  whether  the  majority  of  them 
perished  there  or  not.  But  such  was  the  merciless 
character  of  warfare  even  amongst  the  highly  civilised 
Greeks  :  and  his  is  a  military  history,  and  not  a  moral 
discourse. 

Another  characteristic  feature  in  which  the  work  of 
Thucydides  presents  a  remarkable  contrast  to  the  style 
of  modern  historians  has  already  been  partly  noticed. 
The  long  and  elaborate  speeches  which  he  introduces 
from  time  to  time  form  almost  a  distinct  literary  pro¬ 
duction.  They  do  not  rise  from  the  narrative,  but  are 
fitted  into  it.  So  involved  and  difficult  in  their  lan¬ 
guage  and  construction  that  Cicero  pronounced  them 
wellnigh  unintelligible,  they  often  serve  rather  as  ob¬ 
structions  in  the  reader’s  course  than  as  aids  to  his 
realisation  of  the  story.  The  young  student  of  Thucy¬ 
dides  is  sometimes  recommended  to  pass  them  over  in 
his  first  reading,  and  confine  himself  to  the  actual  his¬ 
tory.  But  they  serve,  no  doubt,  a  definite  purpose  of 
their  own.  They  are  essays  on  the  political  questions  of 
the  times ;  they  give  the  author’s  view  of  the  motives 
which  actuated  the  leaders  of  the  several  states  engaged 
in  the  great  war.  They  form,  in  fact,  the  philosophy 


188 


THUCYDIDES. 


of  the  history  as  distinct  from  the  facts.  They  may 
have  represented  here  and  there  the  substance  of  the 
argument — in  some  fuw  cases  even  of  the  language — 
actually  used  by  the  speakers  named :  they  reflect  some¬ 
times — notably  in  the  case  of  Cleon  and  Diodotus 
— the  divided  voice  of  public  opinion;  hut  we  are 
more  certain  to  find  in  them  the  view  in  which  the 
great  question  of  the  hour  presented  itseK  to  the  his¬ 
torian  himseK.  Whether  the  speaker  he  Athenian, 
Corinthian,  or  Syracusan,  the  voice  and  langiiage  are 
still  those  of  Thucydides.  A  remarkable  language  it 
is;  reminding  us  now  of  the  involved  periods  of  St 
Paul,  and  now  of  the  speeches  of  Cromwell,  in  which 
the  expression  vainly  struggles  with  the  thought.  The 
style  is  evidently  moulded  on  that  of  the  professional 
rhetoricians  to  whom  the  Athenians  loved  to  listen; 
and  the  author  addresses  himself  to  both  sides  of  the 
argument  with  all  the  ability  of  a  practised  advocate. 
If  it  had  not  been  that  the  interest  of  a  great  war 
called  forth  his  powers  as  a  historian,  Thucydides 
might  have  filled  the  chair  of  his  teacher  Antiphon, 
instead  of  recording  his  fate. 


END  OP  THUCYDIDES. 


/ 


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Date  Due 


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//  tf. 

H  Library  Bureai 

1  CAT. NO. 1152 

DATE 


0  LQLQQZVO  1-806  8 

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